Morgan vs The Truth
by atlee
Summary: Morgan investigates the mysterious events that shattered his life. Last two chapters in! In Chapter 12, Morgan has the talk he's been waiting for. In the Epilogue...and epilogue.
1. Chapter 1

_I don't own Chuck, or any of its characters. I also don't own a giraffe._

_This is a bit of a 180 from the other story I did, but I thought I'd try something different. I hope everybody will bear with me on this._

_This is a bit of an A/U story, deviating from around midway through Season 2 (and about 6 months in the future)._

Chapter 1

"Morgan!"

I had been staring intently at the wall, and hadn't heard her come in. I turned to her, somewhat reluctantly, and studied her face. At one time, I had seen something I had thought could have been love there. Maybe I was fooling myself at the time. I'd misread women before. Whatever it was, it wasn't there now. All I could see was frustration, impatience, and a little bit of pity.

"Anna." I held my arm out to her. She studied it, as if it was radioactive.

"We were supposed to meet for dinner two hours ago."

I winced. "Sorry. I was just checking up on something, and…"

"Morgan," she glared at me. "I don't want to hear about it. You left me waiting at that restaurant…"

"I said I'm sorry. But I've got to tell you. I figured out…"

"I told you, I don't want to hear about it." She looked at me for a while, and her face softened slightly. "Don't you think it's time you gave this up?"

"Anna, I can't give this up. I owe it to Chuck…"

"Chuck's dead, Morgan!"

Anna's eyes were blazing at me. I wanted to return her gaze, but couldn't. Finally, I heard her sigh. Neither of us wanted to have this conversation again. I looked back up at the wall, and studied the various pictures and notes tacked up there. Finally, my eyes found the newspaper clipping, and the headline that always turned my blood to ice. "_Local man dies in automobile accident_."

"I can't do this anymore."

I looked back up at Anna. Her hands were on her hips, and she was studying me intently.

"You have to move on with your life, Morgan. Chuck is gone. I hope you can move on with me. But only if you give all of this up," she said as she gestured towards the wall.

I want to. I really do. I've always cared about Anna. I've always wished the best for her.

Which is why I shake my head, and say, "I'm sorry. I have to keep going. I think I've finally had a breakthrough."

Anna looks at me for a moment, nods her head, and says, "Goodbye, Morgan." She turns around and walks out the door.

She'll be better off without me. I'd known that this day would be coming for quite a while. I almost wish she'd forced the issue sooner.

* * *

I looked back at the wall, and examine the crime scene report I'd tacked onto it. It hadn't been easy getting it, but fortunately one of the younger Buy More employees had some rudimentary hacking skills. I'd had to take several of his shifts in return for the favor. In the end, I'm not sure it was worth it. There wasn't much to see. A single witness had been found, and she had testified that the Nerd Herder had been in the middle of the intersection when the truck had plowed into it. Chuck hadn't stood a chance.

The investigation had been quick. According to the witness, the light had been green for the truck as it drove through. Chuck had been at fault. At least that's what everybody said.

Everybody but me. I knew Chuck too well. He drove like my grandmother, if my grandmother didn't have glaucoma and could actually see over the steering wheel. I tried to find the witness later on to see if she could have been mistaken, but she had moved away. The truck driver also had disappeared shortly after the accident.

I couldn't bear to look at the crime scene photos, and instead turned up to look at another photograph, this one taken a few months earlier, during happier times. Chuck was flashing his trademark goofy smile, with his arm around the woman next to him.

Sarah.

I knew she was the key.

* * *

"So, just like that?" Lester asked me between bites of his sandwich. He wiped a bit of mustard from his face with a napkin, then crumpled it up and tossed it into the Buy More break room's wastebasket.

"Yup. Just like that."

After a night alone with my thoughts, even Lester and Jeff felt like great company. I didn't really share their lunchtime enthusiasm though, as my sandwich lay untouched on the table. Man, I was sick of Subway.

"And you didn't try to win her back? No flowers, no boxes of chocolates? No heartfelt freestyle raps of devotion?"

"I think she's seen everything from the Morgan bag of romantic tricks by now. Besides, it's better this way."

"So she's fair game now, then?"

I turned from Lester to Jeff. He'd scarfed down his lunch already, and had been watching me through this conversation, the wheel clearly turning in his head. It's nice to know that some things never change. Though I have to admit the look on his face was one I hadn't seen before. I guess the prospect of a single Anna Wu will do that to him.

"Yes Jeff, Anna is single and available now."

Jeff grinned. "And after two years with you, her standards are promisingly low."

"You're an idiot, you know that?"

It took a moment for me to realize that Lester had addressed that to me and not Jeff.

"You had one thing in your life to keep you grounded. So now you're just going to spend all of your time going all Angela Lansbury, sniffing for clues that don't even exist."

"But that's what I came here to tell you! I finally found a lead!"

"And what's that?"

"Sarah."

Lester stood up and walked to the vending machine. "Sarah's gone, Morgan. She's been gone since the accident." He shoved his dollar into the machine, and grabbed the candy bar out of the bottom door.

"Exactly."

Lester looked at me in confusion. "Not seeing the point here, man. She moved away after her boyfriend died. Nothing weird about that. Besides, the Orange Orange was closing."

"And the timing of that doesn't seem weird to you?"

"Not really. It's not like the place did any business."

"Right. Would did that place get, two customers a day? And yet, it stayed open for a year and a half." I could see that I had Lester's attention now, as he put the candy bar down on the table. "Before that, it was a Weinerlicious, and that did even worse."

"Well, that wasn't a surprise. Why would anybody open up a hot dog place in Southern California anyway?"

"True. But after, what, two days, the Orange Orange opened up in its place. And now that it shut down, that place has stayed closed for the last six months. Why wouldn't anybody else move in? This is a big shopping center." Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Jeff snatch Lester's candy bar.

Lester looked at me intently. "Ok, I see what you're getting at," Lester nodded. "Sarah secretly opened up her own restaurant, just so she could be close to Chuck. And then, she decided to kill him. Seriously dude, that's brilliant! Dude!" he turned to Jeff, and snatched the candy bar from his hand.

"Well, something isn't right about it. It seems like something's being covered up. For all we know, Chuck may not even be dead."

Both Lester and Jeff were now looking at me sadly. "I thought I was supposed to be the conspiracy theorist," Jeff remarked. "Are you going to eat that?" he gestured at my sandwich.

I shrugged. Lester had a point, but I knew that something wasn't right about the whole situation. I just had to figure out what it was. Somehow, I doubted that Lester and Jeff would be much help with that. I glanced at my watch. "1 PM. I'd better get out of here."

"Eh, you're probably safe. The manager hasn't showed up so far today."

"Really? That doesn't sound like the esteemed Emmett Milbarge."

"Yeah well, I've learned not to ask. Still, if he sees you here on Buy More property, well, you remember what happened last time."

"Well, I don't particularly want to see him either." I stood up. "Well, you gentlemen enjoy the day in Buymoria." The name still brought a smile to my face, if only for a fleeting moment.

"Yeah, and you try listening to yourself. We've got a sale on tape recorders. Buy one, and record yourself talking. You'll see how insane you sound."

As I carefully stepped out of the Buy More back entrance, I shook my head. My best friend was gone, I was out of a job, and my girl friend had dumped me, but you don't realize how bad things get until Lester Patel becomes the voice of reason in your life. Still, I had to keep going. Chuck had meant too much in my life for me to give up now.


	2. Chapter 2

_A/N: Here are some things I don't own: an iPhone, any music by Nickelback, the Chicago White Sox, and the rights to Chuck._

Chapter 2

Contrary to what you may have heard, there are a lot of great places to while away an afternoon in the Burbank area. In my younger days, I used to enjoy spending time at one arcade or another. Of course, for me my younger days went on until age 27, so I'd have to say that I am experienced enough to say that the Burbank Hall of Records is not one of those great places.

And yet here I am.

If Chuck were helping me with this, he'd have probably figured out a way to find the information I wanted just by using a laptop, and he'd have been able to do it on his couch watching old X-Files reruns. But Chuck can't help me on this, which is why I'm flipping through old books covered in more dust than the exercise equipment in my bedroom.

The good news is that my efforts seem to have paid off. The shopping centre where my former place of employment stands was actually owned by a holding company named Hammaker Properties. I'd remembered Big Mike ranting about them on occasion, so I was able to remember the name and find the appropriate records fairly quickly. Sure enough, Hammaker Properties owned the land covering the entire shopping center, with the exception of one 800-square foot block.

The 800 square feet, to be exact, that the now vacant Orange Orange stands.

According to the records, the site had been owned by Hammaker until two years ago. The land had been leased by several companies through the years, including an automated photo developer, a Mexican restaurant, and a novelty t-shirt store. Unfortunately, while I could find a record of the property being sold, I couldn't find a thing about who it was sold to.

I looked up at the front desk, and decided I wouldn't find any help there. The woman manning the desk (and from her appearance, I do mean "manning") had no interest in helping me with my endeavor. She had already given me the evil eye earlier when I had cracked open my grape soda, and I got the sense the visitors were only tolerated for a very short while. Clearly, the Hall of Records was meant to be taken for granted, and not actually visited.

I flipped through a few other books, and found a few other references to Hammaker Properties, but nothing about the sale. I managed to find a book of licensed business in the area, and wasn't exactly shocked to find that there were a large number of yogurt shops in the greater Burbank area. But none named Yogurt Yogurt. I didn't see any references to Weinerlicious either, but I didn't look too hard for one, fearing the type of establishments I might find.

I decided to try a different tactic.

* * *

Once I ducked out of the main records room, I opened the first unlocked door I could find, and entered. It was a supply closet, not exactly cozy, but it would serve for my purpose.

I dug out my cell phone and entered in the number I had jotted down in the other room. After a couple a rings, a woman's voice answered, "Hammaker Properties, this is Sheila."

"G'day Sheila, I'd like to talk to you about some of property that you blokes own."

I admit, I'd panicked, and an Australian accent was the first thing that came to me.

To my surprise, she didn't hang up. "Of course, Mr…"

I racked my brain for a minute. "A Mr. Dundee…Gibb." I really need to work on my improvisation skills.

"Of course, Mr. Gibb. Could you tell me which of our holdings you would like to know more about?"

"Why, I believe you own the property around that Buy More in Burbank?"

"That is correct." From the tone of her voice, she still didn't seem to suspect anything.

"Well, I just happened to notice there is a storefront that is currently vacant. I believe it used to house some sort of yogurt shop. I'd like to know if I can purchase it."

"I see." I thought I detected a slight shift in her tone. After a moment, she said, "Hammaker Properties does not own that property any more."

"No worries, Sheila. Perhaps you could tell me who the current owner is. It is such a shame to leave such a prime area vacant."

"I'm afraid I can't give you that information."

The woman sounded reluctant, so I decided to press on.

"Oh Sheila, Sheila. You're making me sad. You don't even have a number I could call?"

There was silence for a minute. "You sound so nice. Has anybody ever told you that you sound like Hugh Jackman?"

I had actually been going for Russell Crowe. Still, close enough. Maybe taking drama in high school was a good idea after all.

"You're sweet, Sheila. So can you help a poor Aussie out?"

"I think I have an address here. It's been crossed out, but I can kind of read it. It looks like…129 Blackmoor Avenue, Glendale, CA."

I couldn't believe this had worked. "You're amazing, Sheila, you know that. If you're ever in my home country…"

"So what part of Australia are you from, Mr. Gibb?"

"Um, Sydney."

"Really, I was just in Sydney last year. Which part?"

I realized things were going downhill. "Well you know, Sheila, that's a funny story. I'll tell you…Wait is that a kangaroo coming at me? Gotta go!" I hung up quickly.

* * *

It was too late in the day to check out the Glendale address, so I decided I needed to share my moment of triumph with somebody that would appreciate it. Unfortunately, that person didn't answer the door when I knocked.

"Hello Morgan."

"Hey Devon," I said, nodding at Captain Awesome. I still think of him as Captain Awesome, even though the last few months had aged him as much as it had any of us. He still looked like a "Men's Fitness" model compared to most of us, but he had clearly lost something. Still, it hardly seemed fair of me to refer to him as "Captain Above Average."

"Is Ellie here?"

"No she's not. She's at work."

"That's too bad. I've got some good news for her. I've got a lead on, you know."

Devon stepped out of the house, and shut the door behind him. "I don't think it's such a good idea for you to talk to her, man. She's had such a tough time these past few months. Now that she's finally made some progress, starting to work at the Children's Center, I just don't want her being dragged down again."

Normally, I'd resent being insulted by him, given our rivalry over the same woman. But, I suppose I could understand the concern in the eyes that were staring back at me. Ellie had been in bad shape after the accident. They'd taken Chuck to her hospital, but there had been no chance to save him at that point. She'd hadn't been on duty at the time, but that hadn't stopped her from torturing herself with guilt. She'd left the hospital shortly after the funeral. A couple of months ago she'd started working at a clinic for underprivileged children in downtown LA. Perhaps she was putting the past behind her. I still wanted to talk to her, but I could see that Awesome wasn't going to help me. I couldn't blame him.

"Alright Devon, I understand. Give her my best." I turned around and headed back to the parking lot. I heard the door shut behind me.

* * *

As I reached my car, I found two uniforms waiting for me. I recognized both of them.

"Well, if it isn't Morgan Grimes. Long time no see," the male officer said.

I looked them over. I could tell this wouldn't be a fun conversation. "Officer Wallace," I nodded at the female officer. "Officer Gromit," I said to the male.

"That's Grimmeault."

"Right. Sorry, Grimmeault. Is there something I can help you with?"

"We were just hoping we could have a nice conversation," Wallace replied.

I shrugged. "Why not?" I didn't exactly have evening plans.

"Not here. We were hoping we could head down to the station for a bit." Grimmeault gestured towards the squad car parked a few feet down.

This didn't sound good. "I suppose," I said warily. "Could I ask what this is about?"

Wallace studied me for a moment as we stepped to the car. Finally she said, "We'd like to talk to you about your buddy Emmett Milbarge."


	3. Chapter 3

_After rummaging through my closets for the last few days, I can safely say I don't own a single "Chuck."_

Chapter 3

The wall of the interrogation room could definitely use a new coat of paint.

OK, I'm sure that's not a particularly interesting revelation. But it's what was going through my mind as I sat there, so I figured I was duty bound to mention it.

Besides, I didn't really know a whole lot about what was going on anyway.

Officers Wallace and Grimmeault had left me in here after we had arrived at the police station. That had been about fifteen minutes ago. I had seen enough cop shows on TV to figure that they were planning their approach, and were probably watching me through the one way mirror at the other end of the wall I was staring at.

Finally, I heard the rattle of keys from beyond the door, and in walked my two captors.

They sat down at the table in front of me, and watched me for a second. I watched back. Officer Grimmeault still looked as if he had been carved from stone. His black hair was receding, his close-set eyes were boring down on me, and his large hands looked like they were just waiting for the go-ahead to pound on to the person unfortunate enough to get in their way. All in all, he reminded me of a guy who'd recently worked at the Buy More.

Officer Wallace looked only slightly more friendly. Her reddish-brown hair was tied back, and her brown eyes studied me intently. Her fingers were drumming on the table impatiently. I wasn't sure why she was so impatient, since the ball was in their court.

Finally, the show started. "Why'd you do it, Morgan?" Grimmeault asked me, in a gruff, but not entirely unkind, way.

I looked back at the wall. I've done many things I'm not proud of, including some that involved Emmett Milbarge. But I couldn't imagine any of them would interest the police. At least nothing recent. "Do what?"

"I think you know what." His voice was slightly less unkind this time.

"No really, guys. I'd love to help you. But, uh, maybe you could clue me in first."

"You've been seen at the Burbank Buy More lately on several occasions." This came from Wallace.

"Ok, that's true. I was visiting."

"Visiting Emmett Milbarge?"

"No, I didn't particularly want to visit Emmett. We aren't exactly friends."

Grimmeault leaned forward slightly, and I could smell onions on his breath. "Oh, we remember that Morgan. No disagreement here."

"So, Morgan, where were you last night?" Wallace asked me.

"Last night? Why do you ask?"

"Just answer the question, Grimes. Last night, where were you?"

"Well, I...was home."

"Interesting. Anybody that can verify that?" Grimmeault asked.

"Well, there's my girlfriend."

"Ah yes, Anna Wu. We spoke to her earlier today. Nice girl. She said you stood her up for dinner last night."

"Well, that's right, I guess. I forgot."

"Call me crazy, but that seems hard to believe. I think if I were you, I'd be thanking my lucky stars I had a girlfriend at all, and would make extra sure to do everything she wanted."

He was right, of course, but I didn't feel much like agreeing with him.

"By the way, during our conversation, she mentioned that you know longer live at that apartment."

Ouch. I glared at Grimmeault, noticing out of the corner of my eye that Wallace was also giving him a look.

"She was putting all of your stuff into boxes when we talked. Nice doll collection, by the way. But we did convince her to give us these." Grimmeault slid several pieces of paper onto the table.

"Is that how you spend your spare time?"

I glanced at the scattered remains of my investigation wall. I noticed that everything had been scrambled such that they were now out of order. I chose not to complain about this.

"You obviously didn't take the death of your friend too well."

I looked up at her. "How would you feel? Suppose he," I gestured at Grimmeault, "got run over by a truck. Wouldn't you want to know exactly what happened?"

"Sure, but there's one difference between you and us," Grimmeault gestured at himself and Wallace. "We're cops. You are an electronics salesman. Or used to be."

Grimmeault paused for a moment, almost theatrically. I wondered if he'd taken drama in high school too.

"So your friend's death is eating you up inside." He gestured down at the pictures and clippings scattered on the table. "And who is there to blame? How about the guy that sent him on that call in the first place? The Assistant Manager, Emmett Milbarge?"

I don't know if I was more worried about what was going on, or relieved that they were finally getting to the point.

"That was his job."

"Oh sure, but he could have sent anybody out on that call. But he didn't. Because he liked to pick on you and your friend Chuck, didn't he? So who else is he going to send out there but your pal?"

Involuntarily, I clenched a fist with my hand. I didn't realize it until I saw both cops staring at it. I tried to relax.

"Well that's a bit silly, don't you think? I know that he didn't intend for anything to happen."

"That's very rational of you." Grimmeault paused again. He definitely watches cop shows on TV to develop his act. "But, I seem to recall how we first met. You weren't all that rational then, were you?"

As he hunched over the table looking at me, I wondered if he expected me to confess or applaud. I glanced over at Officer Wallace. She looked as if she had seen a few too many command performances as well.

Grimmeault turned to Wallace. "Do you remember that day, Officer Wallace? You and I were called to a disturbance at the Burbank Buy More. It's a bit of a blur, but I seem to remember that day. We had to pull one little geeky-looking guy off of another geeky-looking guy. What a mess." Grimmeault let out a wheezy laugh. "I imagine it's what one of those Star Wars/Star Trek Dustups at those comic book conventions looks like."

"Well anyway, the manager at the store convinces the victim, a Emmett Milbarge, not to press charges. So that's that. Our work is done. But then, Wallace, do you remember? The one little geeky guy says to the other, 'I'll kill you!'"

Grimmeault turned to look back at me. "And now Emmett Milbarge is dead. Funny that!"

* * *

Things didn't go a whole lot better after that. Grimmeault explained that the murderer had hit Emmett on the back of the head last night at the pier. He then went on to inform me that I was that murderer.

Fortunately, I had two things going for me. One, outside of that past altercation Grimmeault so kindly brought up, and my lack of an alibi, there didn't seem to be any real evidence against me.

Two, I knew I hadn't done it. Neither Grimmeault nor Wallace seemed to be particularly swayed by that argument, however.

So, after a warning of "Don't leave town," I was free to go. Neither officer offered to give me a ride home, of course. That meant I had to call for help.

"Hello?" came the answer after I had dialed the number.

"Hey Lester."

"Dude, where have you been? I've been trying to reach you! You won't believe what's happened!"

"You mean Emmitt?"

"So you know."

"Yeah, the, uh, police told me."

"Oh. Yeah, about that. A couple of cops came to the Buy More today, asking around. I didn't say anything, I swear!"

"Don't worry about that. I'm at the station now, and I kind of need a ride."

"Uh, sure buddy. I can take you home."

"Oh yeah, I need another favor. It looks like Anna's kicked me out, and I need a place to crash."

There was a pause. "Oh, ok. Um, I'm sorry to hear about that and all, uh…"

"Dude, I didn't kill Emmitt. And I'm not going to kill you either. I just need a place to crash while I figure things out."

I heard a sigh on the line. "Alright, but you owe me."

* * *

Lester's apartment was small and smelled like old cheese, and his couch felt like it was stuffed with Lego bricks. Still, I didn't have a lot of options. After we had arrived, Lester had said something about a long day, and headed off to his bedroom. After the door closed, I thought I heard the sound of furniture being shoved against it.

I suppose I haven't really earned anybody's trust, given the way I've acted the last few months. Still, it hurt a bit that Lester and the cops were leaping to the same conclusion so quickly.

About a month after Chuck's death, Big Mike began to relinquish more control to Emmitt. He told me his heart wasn't in managing the store anymore. Apparently, Chuck had meant a lot to him as well.

Emmett used his added power to control the store like a petty dictator desperate for someone to go to war with. He would take every action as a personal slight, and eventually began acting out in anticipation of perceived slights. It was hell, and it wore on everyone's nerves. One day, after sending one of the Nerd Herders out on a call, he announced to everyone how much better things were running now that "Fools like Chuck Bartowski were no longer standing in the way of progress."

What can I say? I snapped.

That was my first meeting of Officers Grimmeault and Wallace. Of course, Emmett wanted to press charges. Big Mike, still technically the manager, was able to convince Emmitt not to, but he had no choice but to let me go. I didn't argue.

A few days later, Big Mike left the store, and Emmett officially became the manager.

Until somebody killed him. Now there were two mysterious deaths surrounding me. It could be a coincidence, I suppose, but it doesn't feel like one. I didn't particularly care who killed Emmitt, unless it was someone involved with Chuck's death. If it was, that person would probably only be too happy to see me go down for it.

Things are getting far too complicated. But there's no way I'm giving up.


	4. Chapter 4

_A guy on a street corner said he was selling "Chuck." But it turned out it was just bootleg Season 1 DVDs, so I walked past. Therefore, I still don't own "Chuck."_

Chapter 4

I woke up to the sound of a ding in the apartment's kitchen area. I winced as I sat up, feeling the effects of Lester's couch in my back. I stood up and looked around.

Lester was standing in the kitchen, wearing just boxers and a t-shirt. He pulled a breakfast burrito out of the microwave, and squeezed some maple syrup onto it. He looked up as I entered. "Want one?"

"With every fiber of my being, no."

Lester shrugged. "So now what are you going to do now, Columbo?"

It was a good question. Now I not only had Chuck's death to worry about, but Emmett Milbarge's as well. I still had some leads about Chuck to investigate. I wasn't sure if I wanted to look too deeply into Emmett's life, but I felt like I needed to know more, given the possibility that the two deaths might be related. Still, it would be difficult, if not impossible, for me to show up at the Buy More now. So, I was going to need help with that.

"Could you do me a favor?"

"Man, your favors are really piling up. Pretty soon, you're going to owe me your first born. Assuming there's actually going to be one."

I decided to let that pass. He was right, I was asking for a lot of favors. "I know, and I really appreciate it. You do believe me about not killing Emmett, right?"

Lester glanced at me as he finished off his burrito. "Yeah, I suppose you aren't really the murdering type."

"Well, I think his death might be related to Chuck's."

"What, like some Buy More serial killer?"

"No, nothing like that. But I still think there's a connection between Emmett and Chuck. So, is there a chance you could look around Emmett's office, see what you could find?"

"Are you kidding? What if there are cops there?"

"Come on. You used to break into Emmett's office all the time! Remember the time you put crazy glue on his office chair?"

"Well, this is kinda different. What am I even supposed to be looking for?"

"Just anything unusual. Something that suggests why someone would want him killed. And better yet, anything that could link him to Chuck."

"Geez, what about something on the Lindbergh baby or Bigfoot? I'll bet I could find that too."

"Ok, already. Just do your best."

Lester shook his head. "Whatever. Man, I am not getting killed for you. Whatever comes out of this, there had better be some glory for me."

"I'll be sure to bring you up when they make the movie version of my story."

"Fine, but I don't work until 5 today anyway. Jeff is coming over for band practice. We've been trying to update our set list. We could use your take on a couple of Amy Winehouse tunes we've been working on."

* * *

It was a tough choice, but ultimately I decided risking the wrath of the police by leaving Burbank was a better option than sitting through Lester and Jeff's rendition of 'Rehab.' Making sure that no police cruisers were in the area, I headed off to the bus depot, and soon was headed to my destination. About a half hour later, I found myself in downtown Glendale. Since I'm not exactly a human GPS, it took me a bit of wandering around to find 129 Blackmoor Avenue.

If I ever wanted to find a more average looking office building, it would be tough. Passing by the brick façade, I entered through the revolving door andheaded down the marble floors. Once inside, I soon found the building directory. The six floors were filled with various dentists, lawyers, and the occasional therapist. Based on my current situation, a lawyer and therapist could both be useful to me, but they would probably be out of my price range. Besides, neither was what I was looking for right now.

At least, I didn't think so. To be honest, I had no idea what I was looking for. All I knew was that somebody in this building owned the land where the Orange Orange stood.

I noticed the guard at the sign-in desk was eyeing me suspiciously. I couldn't see myself getting past him, and I wasn't learning anything just standing there. As I entered I had seen a deli located within the ground floor of the building, so I headed back and ducked inside.

Once I grabbed my sandwich and grape soda, I sat by the entrance so I could see anybody entering the building. I wasn't sure who I was expecting, but I'd come all this way, and it was as good a plan as any.

Unfortunately, my plan was quickly thwarted.

* * *

"They must have some really good sandwiches here for you to come all this way."

I looked up to see a woman sitting across from me. Her reddish hair surrounded her face, falling down onto the shoulders of her white, linen shirt. It took me a few seconds to recognize her as Officer Wallace.

"Um, yeah, best in the area."

She looked around. "I doubt it," she said disdainfully. Despite that, she grabbed some of the potato chips off of my plate.

"Most suspects try to go to Mexico when they realize they've been caught. Not many run here. Extradition is a lot easier from Glendale, you know."

"I'm not running."

"Really? Less than a day after we tell you to stay in town, you run off. And then you stop here. Why is that?"

"Well, I'm…running errands."

"Errands? So you take a half-hour bus ride to do laundry?"

"Uh, no. Not exactly." I sighed. I wasn't getting anywhere by being evasive. "I'm looking for someone."

"I see. Is this someone somebody we should be looking for too? Perhaps you could help us out by telling us what you know?"

"I'd love to, but there isn't much to tell. I don't know much of anything."

Wallace chuckled. "I'll bet. Still, even if you don't know anything, you're here looking for something. So what is it?"

Wallace's interrogation technique was a lot different than her partner's. I looked at her, to see if there was any sign that she was trying to trick me or trap me. I didn't see any.

"I think somebody here knows something about Chuck."

"Chuck Bartowski? Your friend that died in the car accident? Is this about all that stuff you had on your wall?"

"I think there was more to it than just an accident. And it has something to do with this place here. And maybe something to do with what happened to Emmitt."

"Care to tell me why you suspect this place?"

"It's complicated. I just know that this is where I'm going to, you know, find the key to everything. Like the one-armed man."

Wallace looked at me for a moment, "So maybe I should be looking around at all the local farmhouses, henhouses, and outhouses?" She cracked a smile. "Grimmeault has a big collection of DVDs he likes to have his partners watch. As research."

"So where is your partner?"

"The police commissioner is giving a press conference about the murder today. Grimmeault wanted to make sure he was there so he could 'accidentally' get in the way of the TV cameras."

"Ah. He must be a lot of fun to work with."

"He's my partner. Yesterday, you asked how I would react if he was killed. Well, to answer your question, I would do everything I could to find who was responsible."

"Well, it's the same for me about Chuck."

Wallace nodded. "Well, I appreciate that. But we can't just have our suspects wandering through all of Southern California. I'm taking you back to Burbank."

I sighed, and got up to follow her. As I headed back into the hallway, someone walking past caught me eye. I glanced back quickly, making sure that Officer Wallace didn't notice.

* * *

The ride back to Burbank was a lot more pleasant than the trip out. Officer Wallace was a more interesting conversationalist than the wino I was seated next to on the bus ride out. It turned out she was a bit of a video game aficionado, and had even played Call of Duty a few times. I hadn't really played much lately, since Chuck wasn't around to compete against anymore. Still, it was fun to talk gaming for a while, even if it was with somebody who thought I might be a killer.

After she dropped me off at Lester's apartment, I let myself in with the key he left under the mat. I'd wanted to point out to him that this wasn't a good idea, since any criminal could let themselves in, but I figured he might take it the wrong way.

Apparently, band practice was over, so neither Lester nor Jeff was there. I was relieved about this, because I had some thinking to do.

If I had to be honest with myself, my wildest hope when I went to Glendale was to find Chuck there. All the evidence I had was a mysterious address, but that wasn't enough to dampen my hopes. I'm not even sure what I would have done if I had found him there, as I'd never seen a ghost before.

Well now I had. Just not the one I'd hoped to see.

I'd only met him a couple of times, but the guy who'd ruined your best friend's life tends to stick in your head.

That's why I was sure the guy that had walked by when I was leaving the building with Officer Wallace was Bryce Larkin.

_A/N: I hope everybody is sticking with me in all this. My original idea was a bit darker than it has been. I guess you can't write a very dark story when it's narrated by Morgan._

_Oh, and please review away!_


	5. Chapter 5

_A/N: Tonight's top story: I still don't own Chuck. _

Chapter 5

Later that night, I stood in front of one of the walls of Lester's apartment, studying the timeline in front of me.

_September 2007. Bryce Larkin dies. Chuck starts dating Sarah Walker._

_January 2008. Wienerlicous closes. Orange Orange opens._

_September 2008. Emmett Milbarge begins working at Buy More._

_December 2008. Chuck dies in car accident. Orange Orange closes. Sarah leaves Burbank._

_January 2009. Emmett becomes Buy More manager._

_April 2009. Emmett killed. Bryce seen in Glendale._

Ok, it wasn't a particularly detailed timeline. But I needed to get my mind straight, and this seemed to be the best way to do it.

Obviously, Bryce Larkin couldn't very well be dead and wandering around office buildings in Glendale at the same time. After getting Chuck kicked out of Stanford, I'd thought of Bryce as something like the devil, but life after death was pushing it.

That meant he had faked his death. And if Bryce wasn't really dead, maybe Chuck wasn't either.

Clearly, I had to get back to Glendale.

* * *

I wasn't sure what I would say to Bryce if I found him again. I'd only actually spoken to the man once. It was right after Chuck had been kicked out of Stanford. Kicked out for stealing a test, to be exact. A test that Bryce had actually taken. Bryce had topped that by stealing Chuck's girlfriend too.

It had been a weekday afternoon. After a couple hours of consistent prodding, I'd finally managed to get Chuck off of Ellie's couch, and so we had headed down to the arcade. After a while, it seemed like he was starting to feel better. But then, as he was fishing through his pockets for another quarter, he looked up and all of the color drained from his face. I followed his eyes, and saw a guy our age walk into the arcade. He stuck out there in about the same way that I'd stick out at a ROTC meeting. He came up to us and said, "Chuck, I need to talk to you."

From Chuck's reaction, I immediately figured out who the guy was, and I decided I'd better do the talking. I moved in front of Chuck, which only resulted in an amused raised eyebrow from Bryce. "He doesn't want to talk to you," I told him.

"I think that's up to Chuck."

I mustered up as much courage as I could and held my ground. Once Chuck had immersed himself in another game, Bryce continued.

"Look, Chuck just needs to understand some things."

"Understand some things? You mean you're not even here to apologize to him?"

"No, I mean, well yes, among other things. But things are a little more complicated than that."

"How can things possibly be more complicated than, 'I'm sorry I got you kicked out of Stanford and stole your girlfriend'? It seems pretty simple to me!"

Bryce sighed. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed that Chuck was staring at the screen but his hand hadn't moved the controller once. I nodded to the side, and motioned Bryce to follow.

"Look, Chuck's a great guy. Such a great guy that he would probably forgive you some day. But not today. I know I probably could only slow you down for, like two seconds, but I'm not letting you talk to him. And then you'd have to tell Chuck how punching out his best friend is 'complicated.'"

Bryce studied me for a moment. Finally he said, "You're a good friend to him, Morgan. Better than me." After that he turned around and walked away. I was surprised he knew my name.

I don't know if Chuck ever did forgive him, but he didn't seem particularly happy when he told me about his death a year-and-a-half ago. Did Chuck know he wasn't really dead?

* * *

I heard the sound of a key in the door, and I turned around to see Lester entering. He glanced at the note cards tacked into the wall. "Dude, I've got a security deposit on this place!"

"Relax, they're just pushpins. Did you have any trouble?"

"Not really. There were a couple of cops in the store earlier, but they left by mid-evening."

"So did you find anything?"

Lester dropped his backpack and laptop onto the kitchen table. Opening the bag, he pulled out a stack of DVDs. "I found these in Emmett's desk. They weren't marked or anything, but they were pushed way back in one of his drawers. I thought they might mean something."

Lester took one of the DVDs and stuck it into his computer. After a moment, a blurred picture appeared on screen. I couldn't see much other than a blurred hand on the side of the screen. "What is that?"

"Not sure." We stared at it for a moment longer.

"It's definitely a hand. Looks like a big ring on that one finger."

"I guess. Maybe we should skip ahead." He moved his laptop mouse a bit, and the screen shifted. Now we could just make out a couple of people on screen.

"Wait, I know what this is!" Lester exclaimed. "I think this is 'Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2!'"

"Didn't that just come out?"

"Yeah, it's not on DVD yet. Don't you see? Emmett is a pirate!"

"I guess. You sure he hasn't just bought the discs?"

Lester shrugged. He ejected the disc, and we tried a couple more of the DVDs. They all seemed to have similarly grainy versions of recent movies.

"I think we've solved it. Emmett was murdered because he pirates movies!"

"Seriously? Some vengeful movie executive smacked him on the head and killed him?"

"Of course not. He'd probably have somebody else do it. Probably a stunt guy or something."

"I dunno. It seems like a stretch to me. And what does it have to do with Chuck?"

Lester shrugged. "You got me. That's your thing."

* * *

Lester ended up watching the movies most of that night. Unfortunately, since he watched them while sitting on his couch/my bed, I didn't get a whole lot of sleep that night. As a result, I let myself out of the apartment the next morning and headed to the store to pick up some coffee.

On my way back, I noticed a generic sedan parked in front of the apartment building. More importantly, I recognized the two people sitting inside the generic sedan.

"Good morning officers," I said as cheerfully as the limited amount of sleep would let me.

"Well if it isn't suspect number one," Grimmeault greeted me. I nodded at Wallace seated in the passenger side.

"So, have you seen anything exciting?"

Grimmeault grunted. "Since my partner informed me about your bit of wanderlust yesterday, we realized we can't take any chances." He glanced at my shopping bag. "Mind if we have a look?"

I shrugged, and handed the bag to him. "I'd have picked you guys up some donuts, but I am on a bit of a limited budget, being between jobs and all."

Grimmeault was flipping through the contents of my bag: bagels, bottled water, some index cards, and pushpins. "So, I'm guessing you're recreating your psycho collage, huh?"

"Trying to. Unfortunately, some of my stuff seems to be missing now, so it's a bit incomplete."

"Oh gee, I'm sorry to hear about that. I'll start a major investigation about it right now. Heads will roll over this, I promise you."

"You wouldn't by any chance be related to a John Casey, would you?"

"Got lots of cousins, could be. So are you going to kill anybody else today?"

I was starting to wonder that myself, the way the conversation was going. I thought about bringing up what Lester had found, but decided against it. I doubted they'd take it seriously, and it would probably get Lester in trouble for removing evidence. "Have you even considered the possibility that I might not be the guy you're looking for?"

"Sure, we're professional police officers, aren't we Officer Wallace? We consider everything. The minute you present a compelling reason why we shouldn't consider you the prime suspect, then we'll let you go on with your life. Whatever that might be." He handed me back my bag. I noticed one of the bagels was gone.

"I didn't kill Emmitt."

"I don't care!" Grimmeault responded. "From 'The Fugitive', you know." I saw Wallace roll her eyes behind him.

"Yeah, I don't think that's compelling enough," Grimmeault remarked. "So if it's all the same to you, we'll keep watching." I heard a phone ring, and Wallace reached into her coat pocket.

"Uh huh, yeah, we'll be right on our way. Thank you, Sergeant." Wallace turned to her partner. "They think they found the murder weapon down at the docks."

"Well whaddya know? Maybe we just wrapped this thing up. Don't leave town again, Mr. Grimes. Another squad car will be here shortly, so don't think that nobody's watching you."

I watched them drive off. Whatever they've just found will either clear up some of my problems, or create bigger ones.

_Chapter 6 coming up soon. Review away, folks!_


	6. Chapter 6

_Here is a brief list of people who don't own Chuck: ex-baseball player Barry Bonds, Danny Bonaduce, former President Warren G. Harding, and me. _

Chapter 6

As I walked back into the apartment, I found Lester and Jeff both standing in the living room. With them was another guy I recognized from the Buy More. He was young, straight out of college, one of the new hires brought in right before I had left. He was wearing an oversized USC sweatshirt and jeans, and he was rubbing his hand in his slightly greasy black hair, knocking aside his glasses in the process. I nodded to him briefly.

"Hey Morgan. You've met Steve, right?" Lester said to me.

"Sure man, from back at the Buy More."

"Well Steve here is going to be our newest member of Jeffster."

"No kidding."

"He was just telling us about his musical experience from back in high school."

"Um, yeah. It was mainly in the marching band. I played the French horn."

"See, Jeff, I was just saying the other day how much we needed the sound of a French horn in the band."

I don't exactly consider myself an expert in music, but I was pretty sure that was actually what Jeffster did _not_ need.

"Man, we are going to rock!" Jeff added, slapping Steve on the back. Steve winced.

"But you know what we're going to need when we really hit the big time?" Lester asked. "We're going to need to make music videos. Now I've already got the artistic vision, you know, with shots of nature, us dressed as ninjas, possibly a giant robot to show the dehumanization of man…"

"Bikini-clad ladies," Jeff added.

"Absolutely. But to do this, we need a cinematographer too. Steve, you've got a video camera, right?"

I sat down at the kitchen table. This might actually be worth watching.

"Um, yeah, I got one with my Buy More discount last year."

"Perfect! See I knew we made the right choice. So Steve, do you think you have any of you past work you could show us?"

"Uh, I didn't really bring anything with me…"

"Oh, that's too bad. It would really help for us to get an idea of your visual style." Lester snapped his finger. "Wait, I've got a better idea. How about we show you something that will give you an idea of what we have in mind!"

Lester motioned to Jeff, who carried the laptop to the coffee table, flipped it open, and punched a couple of keys. The grainy DVD image appeared on screen. Steve looked around uncomfortably.

"I love the use of the hand on screen. It really contrasts with the black screen. Almost Bergmanesque, I'd say. Oh, and the ring on the hand? Pure genius!"

Jeff pointed to Steve. "Hey, is that a class ring on your hand? It looks exactly like the one on screen!"

Steve looked around at Lester and Jeff, who were now huddled over him. He turned around to try to get away, but Jeff pressed a hand on his shoulder, and pressed him back down on the couch. In his other hand, Jeff held a table lamp, which he turned on and shined in Steve's face.

"Hey!"

"Well Steve, I think you'd better start talking. Tell us why you killed Emmitt."

"Killed Emmitt! What are you talking about?"

"We found that DVD in Emmitt's office. Explain that!"

"Well, yeah, he asked me to make those recordings." Steve looked around, seeing three sets of eyes staring at him, and gulped. "He came up to me right after I started. Said he had a side project he wanted me for. He gave me twenty bucks to sneak into a theatre and record a movie. After the first one, he'd keep asking me to do more and more."

I walked up to Steve. "Do you know who he was selling them to?"

"I'm not sure. He'd meet somebody at the docks, I think. I believe he once said that his first buyer flaked out and disappeared, so he had to find somebody else. That's all I know, I swear?" He looked back at Lester. "So am I still in the band?"

Lester nodded to me and Jeff, and we huddled in the hallway. "So what do we do with him? Give him to the police?"

I knew my life would be easier with more suspects around me. Still, Steve didn't seem like a killer to me, just a scared kid, so I couldn't just throw him to the wolves. "Actually, I think he can help me out."

* * *

I have to admit, my relatively small stature comes in handy some times. Still, spending time in the trunk of a 1997 Ford Taurus is not something I recommend. Thankfully, once he'd safely driven past the police car stationed outside the parking lot, Steve stopped, and let me out. "Ok, we're safe," he eyed me warily.

I climbed in to the car and sat in the front passenger seat. Steve wasn't thrilled about this. "Hey, I didn't kill Emmitt any more than you did, but I have to do some things that I'd rather not have my cop buddies around for." Steve didn't look entirely convinced, but nodded. "Still, I need a little more help from you."

"And then will Lester and Jeff leave me alone?"

"I'll put in a good word for you, but those two follow their own code."

Steve sighed. "Alright, what do you need?"

"I need a ride to Glendale."

* * *

A half hour later, we were parked across the street from the building. Steve was seated in the driver's seat, looking nervous and slightly confused. I was carefully watching the door to the building.

"So now what?"

"Now we wait."

"So is this about Emmitt? Are you trying to find out who killed him? Cause I swear I don't know anything else." I just shrugged.

"It's hard to believe somebody would kill Emmitt." I glanced at him. "Ok, maybe not that hard to believe. But jeez, to have somebody you work with every day die like that!"

"You have no idea."

We sat in Steve's car for two hours. Steve spent his time texting, playing with the radio, and occasionally attempting to start a conversation. I spent my time watching the building through a pair of binoculars I'd found by a window in Lester's apartment, and avoiding Steve's attempts to start a conversation.

At about noon, Steve moaned, "Can't we at least get something to eat? I'm starving."

I briefly looked away from the binoculars. "Yeah, why not? There's a deli over there. Grab me a pastrami on rye and a grape soda." I handed him a twenty. Steve hurried out and ran across the street.

I had to admit, I was starting to feel hungry too, not to mention frustrated at not finding anything. Pretty soon, I'd have to admit defeat.

I immediately changed my mind when I saw the man that passed by Steve as he entered the building.

* * *

I watched Bryce head into the parking lot, and hop into a Mustang. After a moment's hesitation, I crawled over to the driver's side, and put the car in drive. I felt bad about leaving Steve, especially since his leaving the keys in the car clearly showed he was no criminal mastermind. I'd left him enough money for a bus ride home, though, and I couldn't miss this opportunity.

I followed two car lengths behind Bryce. I occasionally let another car slip between us, in an attempt to not appear too obvious. Fortunately, the Mustang was unusual enough that it was easy to follow. Eventually, we headed out of the city, and headed south.

I continued following him as we headed down the highway. I wasn't sure if where he was headed would help me find Chuck, but I could still feel my pulse racing as I followed him. Fortunately, I'd seen enough movies to know how to tail someone.

About twenty minutes later, Bryce veered off the highway, and we were soon driving down a residential street. I saw the Mustang turn into a driveway up ahead. I passed by the house, and eventually parked on a cul-de-sac a block away.

I left Steve's car, and walked down the sidewalk towards the Mustang. As I reached the house, I noticed the name "Parker" on the mailbox. If this was Bryce's house, then I guess he wouldn't be able to use his old name. The house was a fairly small split-level, with a small well-kept yard in front. The place gave off an air of happy domesticity, and felt like the kind of place I had once fleetingly imagined Anna and I living. I shook my head, reminding myself of why I was there.

I noticed a window off to the side, and I walked around to peek in. Fortunately, the blinds were open, so I could get a decent glimpse of the inside of the house. I saw Bryce talking to another man, who had his backed turned to me. They appeared to be arguing about something. After a moment, the other man stepped away. I saw Bryce walking towards the window, and I quickly ducked down.

"Geez, that was…" I hadn't heard the footsteps behind me, so I never expected the blow coming to the back of my head.


	7. Chapter 7

_I don't own Chuck. If I did, NBC would be hearing it from me right now._

Chapter 7

"How could you have led him here?"

I carefully suppressed a groan. I could feel the ache in the back of my head, but I figured I needed to hear as much as I can. I couldn't seem to move anyway, from what I could tell.

"Hey, it wasn't my idea to meet here instead of headquarters!" I thought I recognized Bryce's voice.

"Didn't you even check to see you weren't followed? You guys must get some terrific training, if even an idiot like this can tail you!" Something about the way the man pronounced the word 'idiot' sounded familiar.

"Hey, lay off! And need I remind you that if it weren't for you, we wouldn't be in this position in the first place. And besides, I know this guy. He's harmless."

"Maybe. But if he can find you, then Fulcrum can to!"

'What's Fulcrum?" My curiosity finally got the better of me, and I mumbled the question. I struggled to open my eyes, feeling the strain of the light hitting me. Bryce came into view first, his face a mixture of frustration, curiosity and concern. Then I managed to get a look at the other man.

"Oh crap!" The voice _had_ been familiar.

"Well Casey," Bryce chuckled, "I think he knows you, too!"

* * *

When he worked at the Buy More, John Casey scared the heck out of me. That was while wearing the store's green polo. Without it, he seemed about ten times as frightening. Casey's permanent scowl was now surrounded by a goatee, and he was dressed all in black, with a short-sleeved shirt revealing the arms that seemed to be anxious to throttle me right now.

I looked down briefly. I was seated in a lounge chair, which would probably be quite comfortable if one didn't have his wrists and ankles bound to it. Otherwise, the room was pleasant, with an overstuffed sofa, coffee table, and plants scattered about the room. "Nice place," I muttered.

"Grimes." The name came out of Casey's mouth like the sputtering of a broken-down engine. "How about you tell us what you're doing here?"

I turned to Bryce. At least his grey suit made him seem slightly friendlier than Casey. He rejected my unspoken appeal, shaking his head. "I'd answer him if I were you."

"Well, I just stopped by to invite you to a little Buy More reunion we're having next week. It's going to be a real rager too. You know you're a hard guy to…"

"Stop." Casey held his palm up, looking like a grouchy traffic cop. "I was actually worried I wouldn't get to torture anybody today." I gulped.

"Casey…"

"Oh shut up, Larkin! Need I remind you again that it was your incompetence that led him here to my house."

"This is your house?" I looked around. "You know, I'd never guess."

"Grimes. When we were 'working' together, I didn't like you. Now that we're out of your little Nerdland and in my world, I've realized that I really don't like you. Do you know what I do to people I really don't like?"

"There are people that you do like?" I saw Bryce wince after I said this.

A growl slowly worked its way out of Casey's throat. "I am really going to enjoy this."

"Casey! He's his best friend. You can't do it!"

Casey sighed, and his shoulders slumped slightly. "Fine." He turned back to me. "But you'd better start talking. How did you get here?"

"I followed him from that building in Glendale." As I pointed at Bryce, my thoughts returned to what he had just said before. "Do you know something about Chuck?"

"How did you find that building, Grimes?" Casey moved in front of Bryce.

"The Orange Orange. I tracked the people that owned it over there."

Bryce and Casey looked at each other. "Not bad," Casey said grudgingly. "But if this numbskull can put it together, then…"

"Morgan," Bryce interrupted Casey. "Why did you come here?"

"I want to find out what happened to Chuck."

"Chuck's dead."

"Yeah well, dead doesn't seem to mean what it used to," I looked at Bryce. "And now I find you two together. A corpse and the world's angriest electronics salesman."

"Oh, you haven't seen me angry yet."

"But what's all this secrecy about? Did one of you kill Emmitt?"

As soon as I asked the question, Casey turned sharply towards me. "Emmitt is dead?" He no longer appeared angry, and almost seemed frightened.

"How did Emmitt die, Grimes?"

"Somebody killed him. Hit him over the head at the docks in Burbank. Geez, I didn't think you were close, Casey."

This did little to reassure Casey, as he grabbed a phone out of his pocket, and marched out of the room. I looked over at Bryce. "So uh, Bryce, what's up?"

"You really shouldn't have come here, Morgan."

"I just need you to tell me. Is Chuck alive?"

Bryce sighed. "I'm sorry, Morgan."

I looked down. "I just thought that…"

I was interrupted as Casey walked back into the room. "We've got a problem." He grabbed a remote off of the couch, and turned on the room's television. I turned to watch it, and saw my own face staring back at me on screen.

* * *

"…manhunt for this man, wanted for questioning in connection for the murder of Emmitt Milbarge, 38, who was found dead by the Burbank pier two nights ago. If anyone sees this man, you are asked to call the police tip line, and do not approach him, because he is considered armed and dangerous."

I heard Casey chuckle behind me after that last statement. I just stared at the TV. They'd used the picture from my old Buy More ID, which wasn't exactly my most photogenic moment. Filling the screen and in black and white, it almost made me look intimidating. Normally, I might be proud of that, but this was a special circumstance.

"This can't be happening, I didn't do it!"

"Why do they suspect you? Were you seen with him recently, or do anything to raise suspicion?" Bryce asked.

"No! They know I had a fight with Emmitt once, and they've used it as a reason to keep a watch on me and follow me around."

"Oh wonderful, so they know you're here?"

"No, of course not. I snuck out this time."

"What do you mean, this time?" Casey pronounced that question very slowly.

"Well yesterday, when I found your building, they kind of… found me."

"Well this just keeps getting better and better. If they know about the building, they've connected you to us!" Casey turned around stomped about the room, muttering to himself. "Why am I cursed to be surrounded by idiot nerds?"

"Casey, relax. We just have to get him out of here."

"We can turn him in. That would solve our problems."

"Um, but why would I be here? You'd have to explain that."

"I don't know. Maybe you followed Larkin after some lover's spat."

"Not funny, Casey."

"Look, when they come for me, I could just tell the police that you're living here under some assumed name. I think they might be interested that Mr. _Parker_ has a fake name."

"Are you really threatening me, Grimes? Are you sure that's wise? Because we're in my house, so I can protect myself against intruders. The cops aren't picky. They'll take a dead suspect just as happily as an alive one."

"C'mon Casey, you know we can't do that."

"Fine. But since you brought him here, you get rid of him."

* * *

"That guy does not like me."

Casey had stormed off again, leaving a trail of muttered curses behind him. Bryce had pulled out a pocket knife, and for a moment I thought he was going to follow Casey's suggestion, and make a dead suspect out of me. Instead, he cut through the rope tying my arms and legs to the chair.

"Well, he's gruff with about everybody. But you seem to be able to get under his skin like almost nobody else can. I've only seen one other person be able to do that."

"His mother?"

"Chuck." I was a bit surprised. I'd seen Casey and Chuck hang out together on occasion, which I'd never understood, but I assumed they had developed some sort of weird bond. I couldn't imagine why they would spend time together if Chuck annoyed Casey so much.

"Casey kind of feels responsible for what happened to him. He's taken everything a bit hard. And you pressing him like that didn't help, you know." He finished untying me, and I got to my feet.

"Why would Casey feel responsible about what happened to Chuck?"

"Come on, Morgan, we have to get you out of here." Bryce opened the door, and we headed out the door and into his Mustang.

"Where are we going?"

Bryce ignored me as he started the engine. Apparently, there wouldn't be any more time for sharing. But I wasn't going to give up. Clearly, Bryce was hiding a few things, and I had a car ride ahead of me to find out the truth.


	8. Chapter 8

_My daddy always told me that the world is divided into two kinds of people: those that created "Chuck" and those that didn't. I belong to the second group._

Chapter 8

As we stepped outside of the house, Bryce reached into his pocket, pulling out what was clearly not a toy gun. He must have seen my eyes go wide, as he said, "Relax, I'm not going to shoot you."

"But you're going to shoot somebody? The police?"

"It's not the police I'm worried about. Hmm," he studied the gun for a moment. "Stay put!" Bryce commanded as he headed back inside.

As I stood there, the sound of my phone ringing practically sent me flying onto Casey's roof. Shaking, I answered, "Hello?"

"Morgan, what the hell is going on?"

"Oh, hi Anna."

"Dammit Morgan, you know you're all over the TV! What have you done?"

"Anna, I swear none of it is true. C'mon, you know me!"

"The way you've been acting the last few months, I don't know what to think anymore." I heard a sigh on the phone. "If you're not guilty, then just turn yourself in. Let the police sort everything out. Running is just going to make things worse."

"I don't think that's a good idea, Anna. Things have gotten very complicated."

"Morgan, for once in your life, don't be an idiot. Turn yourself in."

"Anna, everything's going to be fine…" I was interrupted by the phone being snatched from my hand.

"Are you trying to get yourself caught?" I tried not to stare at the two guns now in Bryce's hands.

"It's just my, uh, ex-girlfriend."

"Oh yeah, cause that's somebody that would never turn you in. Get in the car!"

* * *

"Where are we going?"

The Mustang was headed back down the highway. Bryce was staring silently ahead.

Finally, he said, "I'm taking you to a safehouse."

"A safehouse? You have safehouses? Why do you have safehouses? Who are you people?"

Bryce didn't respond.

"Let me summarize the situation as I see it right now. Here you are, a guy who died two years ago. But rather than looking like an extra in a George Romero movie, you're decked out in a suit that's probably a little too new to be the one you were buried in, driving around in a Mustang nobody with a corpse's salary should every be able to afford."

"Instead, you're working for some shadowy, unknown organization, including a guy that the only thing you seem to have in common with is that he used to sell dishwashers at the place where your former Stanford roommate worked. So that's a coincidence?"

More silence.

"And this same secret, shadowy group also happens to own the land right next to where your former friend and your current, scary friend works. And what happens to be standing on that land is a fast food establishment where the girlfriend of your former friend used to work. Does that pretty much cover it?"

Bryce looked at me during that last part, but otherwise maintained his silence.

"So who are you people? The mob? The Men in Black? Some secret government organization? Shriners?"

"All I can say Morgan, is we aren't your enemy. And we are trying to help you."

"Why should I believe you?"

"Well for one, have you ever had a dead guy lie to you before? It's in our best interest to keep you safe. And you don't really have a lot of options, so you might as well trust me."

"Chuck trusted you."

Bryce kept driving for a while. Finally he said quietly, "I know. There's nothing I hate myself more for than what I did to Chuck."

"Well you should. I mean, the test was bad enough, but Jill too?"

Bryce looked at me for a moment. "There are things I did to Chuck that are a lot worse than a test and Jill. Believe me."

I waited for a moment to see if he'd continue. He didn't. I stopped looking at him and glanced out the window. We were approaching the outskirts of Los Angeles.

* * *

"Was Emmitt in your little group too?" We had turned off the highway, and were now seated at a traffic light. It was mid-afternoon, and traffic was beginning to get thicker, so several cars were surrounding us. I noticed a couple of college-aged women in the convertible in the next lane. Both of them were staring at Bryce.

"No," Bryce responded, oblivious to the women.

"Ok. A real answer. Now we're getting somewhere. So who was Emmitt?"

"He was an over-officious busybody who worked at a Buy More in Burbank."

"Well that matches my intel. Not really helpful, though. So where is this safe house?"

"We'll be there soon, Morgan. Crap!" Bryce was looking at the rearview mirror. Behind us, I could see a police car quickly approaching, sirens blaring. "Get down!"

I unbuckled the seat belt and crouched down. Even the floor mats were spotless in Bryce's car. Finally, I heard the siren fade away.

Once I was back in the seat, I looked outside again. We were now in downtown Los Angeles, and not exactly the part you'd want to walk around in. There were probably plenty of other things to keep police officers busy than one on-the-lam suspected murderer. Still, our current location didn't exactly fill me with confidence. It seemed like an odd place for a safe house. At least if you buy into the whole 'safe' concept for safe houses.

"We're almost there," Bryce said, as we stopped at another traffic light. The traffic had thinned out quite a bit by this point. Apparantly, there wasn't a lot of daily commuting in this part of town.

I decided to press Bryce one more time. "Just tell me this," I said. "Was Chuck one of you guys?"

Bryce turned. "What?"

Before I could repeat my question, I was interrupted by a loud pop, followed by the sound of glass shattering. The driver's side window shattered all around. I looked back at Bryce, and saw a growing red splotch underneath his suit jacket. He wasn't moving.

* * *

"Oh crap."

I craned my neck to see behind Bryce. There was a man in dark shades and a long black jacket headed towards the car. His hand held what I could only assume was the reason for my current predicament.

Panicking, I tried reaching into Bryce's pocket, to find his gun. When this didn't work, I tried the next thing that came to find. I unbuckled my seat belt, quickly moved over to the driver's side, and stepped on the gas.

As I hurtled through the oncoming traffic, I tried to avoid thinking about as many things as possible. I tried to avoid thinking about the guy who had just shot at us, a guy who didn't exactly look like a gang member. I tried to avoid thinking about the fact that I had no idea where I was, and no idea where I was going. And I tried to avoid thinking about the formerly and now-once-again dead guy whose lap I was sitting on.

Unfortunately, my lack of thoughts were interrupted by a large black van coming up from behind me. Reacting as quickly as I could, a made a hard right down an alley. An alley that didn't go anywhere.

Trapped, I jumped out of the car, looking for a door to escape through. I finally found one, but the door was locked. At this point, the van had stopped, and the man was coming up to me. "Stop!" he commanded in a voice with a vague Eastern European accent.

"Uh, Ok," was all I could manage in reply.

The man grabbed me by the collar. "Tell me where the intersect is!"

"Um, there's a traffic light back down at the other end of the alley. Is that the one your looking for? I'm not really from around here, so…" my blubbering was interrupted by being thrown against a dumpster.

"I'll only ask you one more time. Tell me where the intersect is!"

"Seriously, I don't know what you're…" I slammed against the dumpster again. Feeling something scratch me, I looked down and could see blood trickling down my arm. A sliver of wood that had been sticking out of the dumpster was now sticking out my arm.

"I promise, this will hurt." The man raised his gun, but before he could fire, there was a flash of smoke, and the man gasped. The gun clattered to the ground. I quickly ran and ducked behind the Mustang. I heard a few more blasts, and risked a glance back, and could see the shadow of the man racing away. My sigh of relief turned into a gasp of pain, as I looked at the scratch on my arm. I've never reacted well to the sight of blood, and I would have doubled over if it wasn't for a hand grabbing my arm. I glanced up at my rescuer.

"Morgan, we've got to go, now!" Sarah Walker snapped at me. In response, I fainted.

_A/N: I'd planned out Bryce's death before is actual show death. I suppose it lessened the impact here, but I didn't seem to make sense to do anything different here at this point. I think I may have looked a bit more sympathetically at the character, but I don't know how much it affected his portrayal here._

_Thanks everyone for all the reviews, and keep doing so (and be as brutal as you need to be!)_


	9. Chapter 9

_Only one of the following statements is true:_

_1) I was the drummer for Ugly Kid Joe_

_2) I own Chuck_

_3) Adam Baldwin appeared in the movie "Full Metal Jacket"_

_4) Yvonne Strahovski plays right field for the Los Angeles Dodgers_

Chapter 9

I awoke to the slight feeling of motion under me. Opening my eyes, I could feel light streaming in my face. I struggled to sit up, wincing at the dull ache in my arm.

We were inside a car, a late-model SUV, based on my limited automotive knowledge. I looked to the side to see the other half of 'we.'

Sarah Walker was in the driver's seat, looking remarkably calm for somebody with a gun in her lap. She was dressed in all black, with her blonde hair tied back in a pony tail. She looked like the most beautiful ninja I had ever seen. I admonished myself slightly for that thought, reminding myself that she was Chuck's girlfriend.

"Are you here to help me find the truth about all of this?" I asked.

"I'm not here to help you, Morgan. I'm here to save your life."

"Well that's…helpful." Looking through the window behind Sarah, I could see we were still in downtown Los Angeles.

"How are you feeling?" Sarah asked.

"Great. You must think I'm so pathetic, fainting like that."

"I think you've got a pretty deep wound in your arm, Morgan. I have to get you to a doctor."

"Oh." Looking back at my arm, I could see a piece of red cloth wrapped around it. On further examination, it didn't look like it started out as a red cloth. "Bryce?" I asked.

Sarah was silent for a moment, but I noticed that she was gripping the steering wheel so tightly that her knuckles had turned white. "I had to leave him there."

"But he's…"

"Yes." There was sadness in her voice, which surprised me until I realized they must have been working together.

"So you and he and Casey, you're all working together?"

"Yes," she answered quietly.

I sighed. "I guess I should have known. You know, everybody used to tell me that there was something weird about you, because you were dating Chuck. I would always say 'You don't know Chuck' and explain how he was such a great guy and it wasn't strange at all that a beautiful woman like you could love him. Guess the joke was on me, huh?"

Sarah looked at me, her blue eyes calmly regarding me. "People don't know what they're talking about."

I thought about that for a bit. After a moment, I said, "So is there anybody that was in Chuck's life that isn't involved in this? I wouldn't be surprised if that guy back there went to summer camp with Chuck in the sixth grade."

Sarah smiled briefly. "I doubt it, unless Chuck went to summer camp in Romania."

"So you know him?"

"By reputation."

"And I'm sure he's got a lovely one, too. So I suppose you're not going to tell me why you 'know of' Romanian killers, are you?"

"I know you want answers, Morgan. Just believe me when I say I'd like to tell you more, but I can't."

I was silent for a moment. Finally, I said, "I'm sorry. About Bryce."

She nodded. "How is your arm?"

"Still hurts."

"Ok, there has to be a doctor near here somewhere." I glanced outside. The neighborhood was still a bit rough, but I had an idea of where we were.

"I know one."

* * *

"Is that Ellie?"

We had stopped in front of a small building. A sign over the door said "St. Stephen's Downtown clinic." Through the window, we could see a tall brunette industriously move about a small waiting room.

"Yeah, she volunteers here."

Sarah looked almost frightened. "Morgan, you go ahead, I'll wait for you."

"You don't want to go in? I thought you and Ellie were friends?"

"We are. Were. I just can't face her. I have to take care of a few things anyway. But I'll be back, and I'll get you to safety."

I left the SUV and headed to the clinic. I guess I was a bit surprised by her reaction. From what I'd just seen of Sarah, it was hard to believe that she would be afraid of Ellie.

A woman looked up as I entered. She studied my face for a moment, and I quickly looked down, hoping that she didn't recognize me. I didn't see any TVs in the waiting room. This was a good thing, as it meant that she may not have seen any of the news reports. "Umm, I'm here to see Dr. Woodcomb."

"She'll be right out." She looked at me again, but then her gaze transferred to my arm. "You need her to look at that?"

"Uh, yeah."

"Well, you're lucky things are pretty slow today. Have you been here before?"

"Uh, no. She just comes highly recommended."

"Ok, have a seat."

The waiting room was a bit lacking in reading materials. Not anxious to leaf through a six-month old 'Star' magazine, I just sat there and tried to process the recent events of the day. I couldn't say I was surprised that Sarah was involved with whatever was going on, since it was her prior place of employment that started me off on the investigation. Somehow, she must know what happened to Chuck, especially since she was so anxious to avoid his sister. Still, she had saved me from the Romanian, so I was inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt.

My thoughts were interrupted by Dr. Ellie Woodcomb entering the waiting room. By her expression, it was clear that, unlike the other woman, she had seen the news.

"Dr. Woodcomb, this man is here to see you."

"Um, thanks Rhonda, I'll take him to the exam room. Please follow me sir."

Once we were inside, she quickly turned on me. "What are you doing here, Morgan? And what's been going on? The police say you killed somebody."

"Well to answer your questions, my arm, more than you can possibly believe, and I didn't."

Ellie removed the cloth wrapped around my arm, and made some 'Tsk' noises. Rubbing a wet cloth on the wound, she said, "Ok then, talk to me, Morgan. Explain to me what's going on."

"It's a long story."

"I can work very slowly if I have to. Does this in any way involve Chuck?"

"I think so."

"How?" Ellie paused to look at me.

"I…don't really know. All I can say is that a lot of people that Chuck knew seemed to have double lives."

Ellie nodded, then walked to a shelf to grab a bottle. "Double how, exactly?"

Based on Sarah's warning to me, I decided that I shouldn't go into specifics. "Something very secret. But somehow Emmitt was involved in something other than the Buy More. And there were others too."

Ellie gave me a long look. "I don't suppose who are going to tell me who these others are."

"I'm not sure I can right now. And I don't know much in the way of details anyway. Ow!" I felt a stinging on my arm.

"Relax, it's just iodine. So some people are involved in something mysterious that may or may not have something to do with Chuck."

"Pretty much. I'm not even sure it's criminal."

"But you think they were involved in Chuck's death."

"Somehow."

"That seems pretty criminal to me, don't you? And they're framing you for this murder, too?"

"You mean you don't believe I did it?"

"Please, Morgan. You may be a lot of things, but you're not a murderer. So, when was the last time you had a tetanus shot?"

"Um, what?"

"That wound is pretty deep. If you haven't had a tetanus shot, I'll have to give you one now."

"Oh well, I'm pretty sure I had one last year."

"I don't believe you." She opened a drawer and pulled out a rather long needle.

"You believe me when I say that there's a vast conspiracy surrounding Chuck's death, but you don't believe me when I say I had a tetanus shot last year?"

"I don't think you have any reason to lie to me about Chuck. As for the shot," she grabbed my other arm and plunged the needle in.

"Yowww!"

"That's what I thought. Here," Ellie handed me a lollipop. "Here. Look Morgan, I think you may have found something. I always wondered about what happened to Chuck. It never seemed to make sense to me that he'd get in an accident like that. I know Devon thinks I'm just been in denial, but a sister knows. Since I started here, things have gotten a little better for me, but I don't know that I'll every really be able to move on until I know for sure."

I nodded.

"But, you are obviously over your head. Whatever's going on, you need to be careful. I think a tetanus shot is the least you should be worrying about."

She was right, of course. I thanked her as she finished re-bandaging my arm. I followed her out the exam room door.

* * *

"I sent Rhonda out for coffee. I don't know if she's seen the news or not, but it would be better if you left before she gets a good look at you."

I followed Ellie back into the waiting room, and found Anna waiting for me. I looked back, questioningly.

"I called her. You came here by yourself, and it's not a good idea for you to drive home. And she's worried about you."

"Are you alright, Morgan?" Anna asked, betraying no sign of our recent troubles.

"Never better," I shrugged.

"Thank you Ellie," Anna nodded to the doctor, and we left the clinic.

"I'm parked down the street," Anna said.

"Listen, you don't need to do this. I'm ok," I protested. I looked around for Sarah, but didn't see her.

"Ellie's right. You shouldn't be driving yourself home. And it's no problem." I noticed she hadn't looked at me since we left the clinic.

"You do believe that I didn't kill Emmitt, right?"

"Of course, Morgan."

"Look, I know I've been difficult at times. I'm sorry for whatever I put you through." She was moving quickly down the block, and I had to hurry to keep up with her.

"I know you are, Morgan." Anna finally looked up, and I saw tears in her eyes.

We turned the corner, and I stopped in surprise. Instead of Anna's Civic, there was a police car parked there. Standing in front of it was Officer Grimmeault. "Well, long time no see, Mr. Grimes." Turning around, I found Officer Wallace standing behind me.

"You turned me in?"

"I'm sorry, Morgan. I know you didn't do anything, but you'll be much safer if you're not trying to run away." Anna grabbed my arm, but I pulled away. "They promised that they will look into everything and figure out what's really going on, so you have nothing to worry about."

"Thank you, Miss Wu. We'll take it from here." Officer Wallace grabbed me, and placed handcuffs around my wrists. Meanwhile, Officer Grimmeault ran through the usual litany about my rights.

"Do you really need the handcuffs?" Anna protested.

"Just routine procedure. Nothing to worry about." Wallace led me into the back of the police car. As we drove off, I turned around to see Anna, now with tears freely streaming down her cheeks.

_I know this was only a very brief appearance for Sarah, but she'll be back. And thanks to everybody again for all the kind reviews!_


	10. Chapter 10

_Our top story tonight: I don't own Chuck._

Chapter 10

I don't know a lot of lawyers. I guess they tend to travel in different social circles than mine. The only lawyer I could think of at the moment was Jeff's cousin. However, since my current predicament did not involve being injured in an accident or exposure to asbestos in the workplace, I doubted that he was an option.

So, I was feeling somewhat less than confident as I rode in the back of the police car. The two officers were talking to each other, sharing some story about a patrolman at another precinct. Finally, Grimmeault looked back at me through the rearview mirror. "So, once again, the Burbank PD gets its man. Or man-child, anyway."

"So everything you said to Anna was a lie?"

"Sometimes protecting the public involves bending the truth a little bit. I'm sure she'll come to understand that eventually."

"I suppose there's no point in me telling you that there's a dead body a few blocks back that way?"

The two officers glanced at each other briefly, then Grimmeault chuckled. "Back there? I'm sure there's more than just one dead body. Why, is it more of your handiwork?"

"I don't have any handiwork. I keep telling you, I didn't kill anybody."

"Yeah, you do. Thing is, we found the murder weapon. A nice, big metal pipe thrown into a drain about a block from the murder site. And you'll never guess whose fingerprints we found on that pipe. Sorry, buddy, it's all over for you."

"But that's impossible. I don't go around touching metal pipes."

"At least the ones you don't use to murder ex-bosses. No, I'm afraid this is an open-and-shut…" Grimmeault was interrupted by a snippet of the song 'Bad Boys.' Grimmeault pulled a phone from his pocket as he maneuvered the car to a side street.

"Yeah." There was a pause as Grimmeault listened to the phone. "Yes, we got him. What?" Another pause. "Are you sure?"

Wallace looked over at her partner questioningly.

Grimmeault looked back and studied me briefly. "I'd say about 5 foot 4, if he's lucky. Yeah, no kidding. Alright." Grimmeault hung up. "The lab boys. You're never going to believe this."

"So the guys back at the lab did some sort of test." Grimmeault explained to his partner. Angle and trajectory, something like that. They say the blow could only have come from somebody at least six feet tall. Which makes it very unlikely that Tattoo back there could have done it."

"Could he have been standing on something?"

"They thought about that. Didn't find anything at the site that would have worked."

Silently, I was promising to watch every episode of every 'CSI' from here on out. Even the New York one.

"Here's the thing I don't get. We matched the blood type on the pipe, and matched the fingerprints to Grimes back there. Grimes was AB+, so it's pretty unlikely we found somebody else's blood. So how could his fingerprints have been on the weapon? You saw the report, Wallace. You went to pick it up yourself…" Grimmeault paused and looked at his partner.

"Sorry, Al." Wallace pulled her gun out, and fired a shot into Grimmeault's chest.

* * *

"Ugh, what a mess," Wallace commented. There was quite a bit of blood splatter around the car, including on me. Wallace pulled out a handkerchief and wiped her face, with the gun still in her other hand.

She turned to Grimmeault's body, which was slumped over in the driver's seat, motionless. "Four freaking months as your partner. I couldn't have taken it much longer. I knew I'd hate being stationed in California. Even the cops want to be actors." She turned to me. "You have some experience working with jackasses. How do you do it?"

"You killed your partner," I pointed out.

"Yeah, well he wasn't much of a partner." She raised her gun. "You and I should talk."

I glanced around to see if anybody else was around. The alley was deserted. Occasionally a car would whoosh by on the main road, but apparently everybody was too intent on getting home to pay any notice to a lone police car parked on a side street. Seeing no options, I decided to see if I could keep Wallace talking. It seemed to work in the movies. "Why are you doing this?" I asked, trying not to stare at the muzzle of Wallace's gun.

The corner of Wallace's mouth turned up in a slightly malicious-looking grin. "One little recording."

"A recording? So this is about the pirated movies?"

Wallace laughed. "You think is about some movies? You really are clueless."

"I, uh, get that a lot."

"No, the movies were just a lucky break for us. That fool who bought them had no idea what he'd found. But with a little…persuading, he led me to Milbarge easily enough. _He_ wasn't much use either."

"So you killed him."

"Actually, he did." Wallace briefly looked back. I turned around, to see the Romanian, along with two other equally intimidating men, entering the alley. The situation was definitely not improving.

"Milbarge was useless, but he did bring me to you. I thought you would just be convenient to pin Milbarge's death on, thanks to your little altercation. We even had your fingerprints when we brought you in for that, so all I had to do was switch the records in the lab. I could never have realized who the friend you were crying about was. It was quite the surprise when we went looking for you at your apartment, and found a whole wall of stuff on exactly the person I was looking for."

"As an added bonus, you even led me to the base in Glendale. Too bad about the tragic explosion there today," she nodded to the Romanian.

"Now," she said, raising the gun to my eye level, "tell me where the intersect is."

"I…I don't know what that is."

"Fine. I'll make it a little easier for you. The intersect is your good friend, Chuck Bartowski."

"Why do you want Chuck? He was just a computer tech?"

"I guess your friend kept some secrets from you. I guess we'll just have to see what secrets you're keeping from me."

* * *

Officer Wallace made a quick gesture, and the Romanian and one of the other goons approached the car. The Romanian opened the door and grabbed me by my handcuffed wrists. I winced, but figured I'd try to stay quiet to appear as tough as possible. I don't think they were fooled.

Wallace had walked deeper into the alley, until she found a large metal door. Finding it locked, she stepped back and shot the lock. She kicked the door in and a resounding crash, and peeked inside. "Oh, this will do nicely."

The Romanian and the two others dragged me through the door. The inside was dark, and smelled faintly of mildew.

I heard a soft click, and the lights in the building flickered on. We appeared to be in some sort of warehouse, with dusty boxes piled up all around us. "Once we're done with him, I need you to take care of that car for me," I heard Wallace tell the others. "Just make it clear that Grimes killed Grimmeault. And then I'll need you to deal with some troublesome lab techs." She paused to look around. "This will definitely do nicely," I heard Wallace comment. "Just the amount of privacy we need."

She nodded to one of her underlings. "Shut the door. We don't want any screams reaching the ears of anybody curious."

I was pushed onto a folding metal chair. The Romanian appeared with a handful of thick rope, and tied me securely to the back. The chair wasn't quite as comfortable as the last chair I'd been tied to. I couldn't believe that had only been this morning. "I've had quite a day," I mumbled.

"It's probably not going to get better. But you could keep it from getting a whole lot worse if you just tell me everything I want to know about Charles Bartowski."

"Uh, well, I'm not sure what you want to know. His first crush was Susie Endicott in the fifth grade. He's allergic to cat dander. He's more of an original Star Trek guy than a Next Generation guy." That earned me a rather hard slap, courtesy of my Eastern European friend.

"If you're going to be a smartass we'll just have to be a bit more convincing." The henchman had returned, and was now carrying a rather rusty box cutter. He gave it to Wallace, who handed it off to the Romanian. "He's more of an artiste with these kinds of things, so I'll let him do the honors."

My mind whirled, trying to come up with a way to get out of this situation. I rejected my first idea, offering the Romanian to double what Wallace was paying him, because I didn't have enough to make my car payments, much less bribe a terrorist. Fighting was clearly out of the question. I couldn't even tell them what they wanted to know, since I didn't know what it was. So I went with the best option I had. I screamed.

The scream by itself wasn't particularly effective. But paired with the sound of the explosion from the doorway, it didn't do half bad. The next thing I knew, one of the henchmen fell down with a bullet in his chest. Wallace and the other two began shooting back by the doorway.

Seeing that I probably wouldn't be contributing much, I leaned to my side enough to push the chair downward. After that, I did my best to curl into a fetal position, which wasn't a very easy thing to do while tied up.

My cowering was interrupted when I was joined on the floor by the other henchman, clutching a wound at his side. His savage look faded away after a few moments. Finally, I noticed the shooting stopped. I tried to see if Wallace or the Romanian were still around, but couldn't see them.

A moment later, I heard footsteps, and then felt the chair being lifted. I found myself staring up at the ceiling while I was being carried out. Finally, we exited through what used to be the doorway, and the chair and I were dropped unceremoniously on the ground. I looked up to see John Casey scowling at me.

"Oh, Thank God!"

Casey grunted. "He couldn't be bothered, so I was stuck with the job." He turned to head back into the building.

"Wait! Aren't you going to untie me?"

Casey looked back briefly, and flashed a slightly unsettling smile. "Why would I do that?" Then he turned and headed back to the fray.

_We're getting to the home stretch, folks…_


	11. Chapter 11

_There once was a show called "Chuck"_

_Which decidedly did not suck._

_Who owns it? Not me._

_But it did reach Season 3_

_When NBC said, "What the…heck!"_

Chapter 11

In case you were ever wondering, sitting in the middle of an alley while tied to a chair is quite an awkward experience. Luckily, there weren't any passersby for me to explain my situation to (though I'm not sure what I could have actually explained). Even more luckily, it was too early for the muggers to come out.

Occasionally, I would hear the sound of a crash, gunshot, or loud grunt coming from inside the warehouse. Based on the various sounds, I tried to figure out who was winning the fight, or even if there was still a fight going on. It was like a more violent version of watching scrambled porn. Not that I've ever done that.

Finally, I saw Sarah run out through the doorway, and head towards me. "How's it going," she asked nonchalantly.

"Oh, just keeping an eye out for any more bad guys." Of course, it had recently become clear to me that I wasn't very good at recognizing actual bad guys.

As proof of this, I squeaked slightly as Sarah pulled a knife out from under her pant leg. However, she just reached around and cut the rope binding me to the chair. "You need to get out of here."

We turned around, only to stop in our tracks. The Romanian was standing in the alley, blocking our escape route. I turned back to Sarah, who pointed to a thin ladder on a wall at the far end from the warehouse. "We'll have to climb."

"Um, are you sure?" I asked, but she was already pushing me towards the ladder. She turned quickly and fired a wide shot at the Romanian.

I uneasily grabbed the ladder, and slowly climbed up. "Don't worry, I'm right behind you," I heard Sarah yell from under me.

"Well I apologize in advance if I fall and land on you."

"You're doing fine. Lucky for us, we're valuable to them, so they aren't trying to kill us."

"Really?" I asked as I heard a gunshot from down below.

"They're just trying to get us to fall. Keep going, and hold on tight to the ladder."

The building wasn't a particularly tall one, so I managed to avoid any 'rope in gym class' flashbacks and reach the top. Sarah was right behind me, turning to fire another shot at the Romanian below. "So now what?" I asked.

"Now, you play right into my hands," a voice said from off to the side. I turned to say Officer Wallace standing there with a malicious grin, her gun pointed right at me.

* * *

"Now that the handler is here," Wallace leered, "perhaps we can get rid of the dork."

"Hello, Bridget," Sarah commented.

"You two know each other?" I rasped, my throat dry in apprehension.

"Sure. This is Bridget Randall. She was brought in a couple of years after me. I'm sorry to see she was turned. She was quite good."

"Brought in where? Turned from what?" I asked, but everybody ignored me.

"Oh, I just saw a better opportunity," Randall sneered. "And point of correction, I'm much better than good."

"We'll see about that." Sarah had moved in front of me.

I heard footsteps from behind, and I turned to see that the Romanian had now reached the roof, and was pointing his gun at Sarah.

"Where's Casey?" I asked.

"Oh, your Casey was apparently no match for my friend here, so I'm afraid he won't be joining us. Now, Agent Walker, drop your weapon, unless you think you can shoot both of us before we take down you or your little buddy over there."

Sarah sighed, and kneeled down to drop her gun. Wallace looked to the Romanian. "Take him out!"

My heart attack was interrupted by a ringing sound from my pants. Figuring I had nothing to lose, I reached down and grabbed the cell phone I'd retrieved from Bryce. I answered. "Hello?"

"Where is my car?"

I glanced up to see that the Romanian and Wallace had been momentarily surprised by the call. I figured my best option was to stall for time. "Um, Chuck?" I said into the phone. I saw Wallace's eyes narrow, and she motioned the Romanian toward me.

"No, this isn't Chuck. This is Steve! The guy whose car you stole!"

"Hey Chuck, this isn't a great time, I'm kind of busy. Maybe you could call back later?"

"Geez, Lester said you were a nutjob, but…" I hung up as I saw the Romanian approach me.

Fortunately, the momentary distraction paid off. While Wallace's eyes had been turned away, Sarah had reached down and grabbed her gun. Now she fired at the Romanian. The shot hit him in the shoulder, and he fell. Sarah turned back to Wallace. Both women had their guns aimed straight at each other.

"So, I guess this is a chance for you to see how good I am."

"I thought you'd never ask," Sarah practically purred. Both women slowly put their guns down at the same time, and moved towards each other.

* * *

As anyone who's seen my DVD collection can tell you, I'm a bit of a kung-fu fan. I could probably name about 75% of all Bruce Lee moves on sight. Back in high school, Chuck and I had re-enacted about half of the fight scenes from "Enter the Dragon" (yeah I know, we weren't that popular).

But this was something else entirely.

Watching Sarah and Wallace fight was, for lack of a better word, amazing. After a while I forgot about the danger I was in, and just stood there watching. Both women were clearly very skilled. Wallace seemed to be slightly more athletic, but Sarah counteracted this by anticipating every attack a half-second before it occurred. Finally, Wallace made a quick move and was able to knock down Sarah. As Wallace moved in for the kill, Sarah scissor-kicked, knocking Wallace's legs out from under her. Sarah quickly leaped on top of Wallace, her knees holding her down.

I sighed in relief, resisting the urge to applaud. If Jeff had been here to witness the fight, he probably would have fainted. Right after complaining about the lack of hair-pulling.

"I guess we've answered that question," Sarah said. "You're good, but not good enough."

"Maybe not," Wallace chuckled. "But it won't matter." Her eyes shifted to the side.

My attention had been so dominated by the fight, I didn't pay attention to the Romanian. He had managed to get up, and grabbed all of the guns. One of the guns was now aimed at Sarah, and the other was aimed at me.

"Get his cell phone!" Wallace commanded as she stood up. The Romanian did as told, slowly approached, his eyes darting between me and Sarah.

As he continued to move, the Romanian passed close by the ladder. A hand reached up from over the side, grabbing the Romanian's ankle. With one deft yank, the Romanian fell sideways. Before he could get up, the other hand appeared, and pulled him over the edge. The Romanian vanished with a surprisingly high-pitched yelp. The yelp only lasted a few seconds, and then was permanently cut off. I winced.

John Casey pulled himself up onto the roof, and motioned his own gun at Wallace. Casey's face was covered with multiple scratches, and there was a bloody patch on the side of his shirt. Extending from this wound was the box-cutter, which Casey pulled out.

"Ugh," he said, "I'm going to need a tetanus shot."

"Um, I know a place." I muttered, but was ignored by everyone.

Now surrounded, Wallace raised her hands. Sarah produced a pair of handcuffs, and quickly put them around Wallace's wrists.

At this point, I think Jeff would have had a heart attack.

* * *

The sun was just setting when we all returned to the alley. A couple of other men in dark suites were waiting for us, and Casey went ahead to speak with them. Sarah still was holding onto Wallace, now looking more sullen than intimidating.

I stood off to the side while Casey, Sarah and the other men escorted Wallace to the back a black van parked in the alley. Then, while the strange men went to deal with what was left of the Romanian, I watched Sarah and Casey in animated discussion with each other. On occasion, I would see one of them point in my direction.

I thought about what had happened to me during the last couple of days. It turned out that I had been right about Chuck, at least in part. Somehow, he was of great interest to whomever Officer Wallace, or Bridget Randall, worked for. And she believed he was alive, even though Bryce had told me otherwise. Bryce, Sarah, and Casey were working against Wallace and her men, which at least made it seem like they were the good guys. And somehow Emmitt Milbarge was in the middle. Clearly, for everything I'd learned, I hadn't learned anything.

Finally, Sarah moved away from Casey and approached me. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah," I replied. "I would have helped, you know, with all the fighting and stuff. But you guys seemed to have it taken care of."

Sarah smiled briefly. "Just another day at the office."

"So what happens to her?" I motioned to the van.

"Well, Casey is going to have a long talk with her, to find out what she knows, and what she's shared."

"So he's an interrogator, like Jack Bauer?"

"Casey is a lot of things." I shrugged. The guy never struck me as the Renaissance man type.

"So what about me? Do I get interrogated too?"

"I don't think that will be necessary."

"Oh." I remembered what Wallace had said earlier. "That building in Glendale? It got blown up?"

Sarah nodded.

"That was my fault, wasn't it?"

Sarah shrugged. "Technically, you did lead Randall to it. But we were prepared. We managed to evacuate everybody beforehand."

"I'm glad." It wasn't the first time I'd been responsible for the destruction of real estate, so I could handle that. Being responsible for the loss of lives wasn't something I wanted weighing on my soul.

"You are a bit of a problem for us, though. Even if you did help us get to Randall and her henchmen."

"So, what are you going to do?"

"You're coming with me."

I gulped.

* * *

You'd think I'd finished being scared for one day, but riding with Sarah wasn't exactly a comforting experience. My initial excitement at riding in a Porsche for the first time was quickly replaced with white-knuckle dread at the first left turn. I didn't speak to Sarah, as I was afraid of distracting her while the speedometer flirted with 80.

I tried to keep track of where we were headed, but the traveling speed and the encroaching darkness of the night made that impossible. I eventually settled into a restful daze occasionally interrupted by gasps of fear anytime I saw oncoming headlights.

After about an hour, we stopped at a gas station. "How much further?" I asked.

"We'll be there before you know it."

"You aren't going to tell me where you're taking me."

Instead of answering, Sarah said, "Why don't you get something to drink in the convenience store? Maybe they have grape soda."

"How did you…"

"Chuck mentioned it once. Why don't you get me one too?"

I nodded, and turned to open the passenger door. However, before I could leave the car, I felt a sharp prick on my shoulder, and the 'open' sign by the store suddenly turned blurry.

* * *

I awoke to find myself seated in another chair. At least this time I wasn't tied up, I thought ruefully. The chair, a rather worn-looking barcalounger in a color that I was sure didn't exist in nature, was at least slightly comfortable to sit in, though apparently not to sleep in. I rubbed my eyes to get a better look at my surroundings. The room was fairly dark, but the light streaming through a window in front of me told me that it was morning. Before I could get my full bearings, I was interrupted.

"Good morning, sleepyhead."

My head whipped to the side, immediately recognizing the voice I hadn't heard in six months.

"Chuck."


	12. Chapter 12

_I don't own Chuck, but I was once offered Season 2 of 'Night Court' in exchange for a Ken Griffey Jr. rookie card, a stick of gum, and a Han Solo action figure. I turned it down._

Chapter 12

It wasn't that I didn't have anything I wanted to say. It was because I had _too many_ things I wanted to say. So the various questions, heartfelt declarations, angry recriminations, and surprised curse words all ended up doing battle with each other, only allowing a single "Bwah?" to escape through my lips.

Chuck smiled. "It's good to see you too, buddy."

I paused for a moment, letting the war inside my head end in a truce. Finally, I asked a question. "So is this the Batcave?"

Chuck gave me a confused look. "You lost me there, Morgan."

"The last thing I remember was being at the gas station last night, and then I felt something in my shoulder. After that I must have fallen asleep. So it must have been like whenever Batman takes somebody to the Batcave. He puts them to sleep so they won't know where it actually is."

Chuck nodded. "Ok. I suppose it's kind of like that. But believe me, I'm not Batman."

"Well, you must be somebody really important. Because why else would you leave me if you weren't some superhero or something? We told each other everything, man!"

Chuck sighed. "I know, buddy. Trust me, I would have loved to tell you everything. And I know when I left it was…rough on you. I wish there had been another way."

"So who are you then? You and Sarah and Casey and Bryce, and who knows who else. What are you people?"

"Well. All I can say is that we work for the government."

"Oh." I sat there for a moment. "This government?"

"Yes Morgan, this government."

"But what do you do exactly? Are you spies or something?"

"Not exactly. I handle…information."

"For how long?"

"About two years now."

I took a while to let that sink in. Chuck had been lying to me for more than a year before he disappeared. I tried to remind myself that what he was doing must be important, given everything I'd seen in the last two days. But that didn't push the resentment away. "So you've been lying to me all that time."

We sat there in uncomfortable silence for a bit. Eventually, we were interrupted by Sarah walking in. She studied the situation, looking at me briefly. Her gaze than shifted to Chuck and she studies him for a while. She moved over to where he was sitting and softly rested her hand on his chin. "You need to shave," she said to him quietly.

"Yeah I know. I just wanted to be here when Morgan woke up." Sarah smiled at him, and headed back through a door at the far side to the room.

I took a moment to study him. Chuck's hair was close-cropped, merging with the several days of stubble that Sarah had commented on. He was wearing jeans and a t-shirt for one of those indie rock bands he used to always try to get me to take an interest in. His eyes looked tired, and he looked paler than usual. I guess he didn't get to go out much any more.

"So you're kind of prisoner here?" I asked.

Chuck thought about the question for a moment. "In a way, I suppose. I know this place doesn't look like much." I glanced around at the sparsely furnished living room, and had to agree. "Still, it could have been a lot worse. It almost was. I guess they need me enough that I have a bit of pull."

"So what you do, you must be good at it?"

"That surprises you?"

Given his recent history, or at least the recent history I'd been aware of up until a couple of days ago, I suppose it might. A Stanford dropout/Buy More Nerd Herder wouldn't exactly inspire confidence. But I knew him too well. "Not at all."

"Well, my bosses aren't exactly big with the positive reinforcement. But they keep me busy all of the time. So I guess I am. And Sarah always tells me I'm doing great."

"So you and she…"

"There are a lot of complicated things about my situation. _That_ may be the most complicated of all."

* * *

Chuck left the room for a moment, and came back with two grape sodas. I nodded briefly when he handed one to me. When he sat down again, I asked, "So you'd been doing whatever it was you were doing for more than a year before the accident."

"That's right."

"What changed? Why did you have to fake your death?"

"The smallest thing," Chuck smiled ruefully. "One of the Buy More's security tapes picked up a conversation between Sarah and I that revealed a bit more than it should."

"The Buy More has security tapes?" I reflected for a moment about some of the awkward things that would have been caught on tape.

Chuck chuckled. "Relax, most of the time nobody ever sees them. But we always take them and erase them before anybody gets a chance to look through them, just in case. But one day the tape was left lying out, and fell into the wrong hands."

I thought about it for a moment. "Emmitt?"

Chuck nodded. "He didn't even watch it himself. He just put it into a pile with all of the other recordings he was going to sell. Unfortunately, the buyer, not knowing what he'd found, figured he'd upload it to the internet to see if anybody could tell him what it was."

"So all of this was because some video was uploaded to YouTube?"

"Pretty much. Once it was up there, the wrong people found it, and they knew exactly what it meant. So I had to disappear."

I remembered the name I'd heard Bryce say this morning. "These people are…Fulcrum?"

Chuck didn't answer for a moment. "There are a lot of people that can't know where I am. The woman you met, Randall, was part of only one group. That's why I have to be dead. It took a lot of convincing for Sarah and I to move here, rather than someplace more drastic."

"And you couldn't tell anybody?"

"No."

"Not even Ellie?"

Chuck smiled sadly and shook his head. "Is she…ok?"

"It took her a while to get over things. But she's been better now. She blamed herself, you know."

Chuck looked down. "Yeah. That's been the hardest thing. But one has to erase all contact."

"Then why am I here now?"

"Well, you have to admit, you've kind of forced the issue, buddy."

I wanted to ask him what that meant for us, but Sarah came back in the room, and put her hand on Chuck's shoulder. She said something to him quietly, and he stood up. "Duty calls, I'm afraid. I won't be too long." He headed out through the back door, leaving Sarah and I looking at each other.

* * *

"He hated not telling you, you know," Sarah said to me after a moment. "You're like a brother to him."

"I guess I can't understand why he can't even talk to his sister. They've always told each other everything."

Sarah shook her head sadly. "I know what Ellie means to Chuck. Their relationship was something…I'd never seen before. Not being able to talk to her, well it's hurt both of us."

"So what happens now?"

"Well, in most cases, you'd be given a brand new identity, cut off all ties with everybody you know, and start a new life somewhere else."

"I see," I said unenthusiastically. My current life wasn't much to speak of, but I wasn't quite ready to give it up.

"Luckily for you, Chuck can be rather persuasive when he wants to be. He argued long and hard for you being someone who can be counted on to keep certain details to himself."

"And they believed him?"

"Surprisingly, yes."

"So I don't have to go into the Witness Protection Program or anything?"

"Not at this point."

Sarah's eyes didn't seem to exactly be in agreement with her words. "You don't agree with this, do you?"

Sarah shrugged. "Chuck knows you better than I do. You do have to understand how important this is, though. Nobody can know where Chuck is. We don't know how much communication Randall had with her organization. There could be other people still looking for him. And that means you, and Chuck, could still be in danger. And I can't let that happen."

The look she gave me after that last part was slightly chilling.

"I don't want to see you hurt, but Chuck is my priority. Right now, I am all he has." She looked past me for a moment. "He's all that I have."

* * *

A few moments later, Chuck returned to the room. "So what have you two been talking about?"

"Oh not much," Sarah replied. "Just you."

"Ha ha," Chuck responded. "Such a great roommate."

"Well, I have to make sacrifices to score such great digs."

Chuck laughed.

"So," Sarah looked at both Chuck and I. "I can't take Morgan home until this evening, so how are you two going to spend the day together?"

We both shrugged.

Sarah shook her head. "Like a couple of eight-year-olds," I heard her mutter as she left the room.

"You know," Chuck said after she left, "I do have a copy of Call of Duty 6."

"Wait, that's not supposed to come out for months!"

"Well, let's just say there are some perks to my current position. It's officially classified as 'training'."

I hadn't really played a video game since Chuck had disappeared. I'd just hadn't had the heart to. Still, I couldn't think of a better way to spend the day.

"You're on!"


	13. Chapter 13

_I checked my 401K today, and I don't own any Chuck. Or much else, for that matter._

Epilogue

The longer I stared at him, the more freaked out I got. This was not my usual reaction to Chuck's face, but there was something about the eyes that were just menacing. Or possibly stoned. It was hard to tell. I took a step back to get a better look. It didn't help.

"Kind of freaks you out, doesn't it." I turned around to see Lester standing behind me. "We didn't have a lot of money left over to do the portrait, so we got a local guy that Jeff knows. We gave him an old photo of Chuck to use, and he did what he could, but still. The perspective is totally screwed up."

I'm no expert on art. My collection is limited to the Spock painting-on-velvet I'd bought at a yard sale four years ago. But I had to agree that there was something seriously wrong with this picture.

"Still, everything else turned out pretty well, don't you think?"

I looked around, and had to agree. The Charles Bartowski Computer Training Center did have a cheerful feel to it, despite the malevolent portrait. I headed over to the side table where Jeff was serving drinks while Lester showed off various parts of the room.

"This area here is just going to be the waiting room. We're going to store the servers in there where the freezer used to be."

"Impressive," I complimented. "It's hard to believe they once served yogurt in here. And Buy More Inc. is paying for all of this?"

"They bought the building. I guess your mystery landlord was a motivated seller, so the land came cheap. Buy More also donated some of the equipment."

"Wow, I can't believe you convinced them to do that much."

"Well I guess they're just excited to have a manager now who doesn't lead a secret movie pirating double life."

"It's true. They totally love Lester as the manager," Jeff commented. "He even was able to convince them to give me the Assistant Manager job."

"Well that and nobody else wanted the job. Really, though, I think the Buy More just wanted some good PR for a change."

"Still, it's really impressive. Chuck would have loved it."

It felt weird thinking of Chuck in the past tense. In the two weeks since I'd last seen him, I'd come to terms with his new life, and I knew I'd probably never see him again. So I suppose in a way, Chuck Bartowski really was dead. He and Sarah were now living their new life, under new names, doing whatever mysterious things they were supposed to do. I figured he'd probably get a kick out of this place, though. He might be a mysterious government agent, but he'd still be a Nerd Herder in perpetuity.

"Well, have you decided about my offer?" Lester asked.

I hadn't, really. "You really want me to run this place?"

"C'mon, you'd be great."

"But I wasn't really a computer guy. I just sold stuff, remember."

"Actually, no I don't really remember you ever selling any stuff. But you'll be fine. Think of yourself as your very first student. Plus, you'll give the place the true feel of Chuck."

"Well, it's not like I've got a lot of other things going for me. Why not?"

"That's terrific. I'll show the rest of the place a bit later. Most of the classrooms are downstairs. You wouldn't believe how much space there is down there!"

* * *

I looked over to see Ellie and Devon huddled off by a corner. I could see tears in her eyes. I sighed, realizing I had to go talk to them.

"Hey guys," I said.

"Morgan," Ellie said, smiling through tears.

"Hey congratulations on your not being a murderer!" Devon said. "Totally awesome."

"Um thanks, man."

"Hey, no prob. Who'd have thought there would be such corruption at the Burbank PD though?"

The official story was that two officers at the Burbank Police Department had been involved in a piracy ring, working with Emmitt Milbarge, a local Buy More manager. However, due to internal squabbles, one of the officers killed Milbarge and the other officer, and was caught trying to flee the country. A day later, Steve gave his notice at Buy More, and took off in the car I'd finally returned to him. The last I'd heard, he'd got a job as a gofer on the set of the new Dane Cook movie.

"So are you disappointed that none of it had anything to do with Chuck?" Ellie asked.

I sighed. "I suppose." I realized I'd been trying not to look at Ellie, and finally willed myself to look up. "So you never did believe that I had found some secret about his death?"

"For a while, but I think I was fooling myself a little bit. I would have liked to have some more closure, but I guess things don't work that way. This place helps though." She looked around and smiled. "I hope you get your closure, Morgan."

"I'm getting there."

"Well don't be a stranger. In a way, you're my link to him." Ellie gave me a kiss on the cheek. At times in the past, that would have been a huge thrill. Now it just made me feel more guilty. And a little bit worried about her six-five, awesomely muscular husband standing next to me, even if he was smiling at the moment.

I guess it's hard keeping secrets from Ellie. I could understand why Sarah had a tough time facing her. Lester had said he'd tried to send her an invitation to the Center opening, but hadn't heard anything back. I wasn't really surprised, given the situation.

I felt a hand on my shoulder, and turned to see Anna standing by me. "C'mon Devon," Ellie said meaningfully. "Let's go mingle."

"Alright but keep me away from that portrait. Seriously not awesome artistry." The two walked away.

"Hi Morgan."

"Anna."

"I'm glad you're ok."

"Thanks." I offered her a glass of punch. She accepted, almost shyly.

"I'm so sorry about calling the cops on you. I had no idea."

"You couldn't have known. They're the police, right?"

"Yeah, I suppose."

"So did you find what you were looking for?"

"Pretty much." I guess the answer was true. I went looking for Chuck, and I did find him. I'd hoped that somehow things would be returning to normal, but of course that couldn't happen and I'd finally come to realize that. One has to move on with one's life eventually.

As coming-of-age stories go, faked deaths and mysterious government ages are a bit unorthodox. Then again, so is having a coming-of-age story at age 26.

"So if you ever want to talk about things," Anna said, a little bit awkwardly. "You know where to find me."

"Ok." I nodded, although I wasn't sure about the idea. It still hurt that she hadn't believed me or really trusted me.

Anna put her arms around me and gave me a brief hug. It felt nice, and I guess I did miss her.

"Holy crap!" I let go of Anna and looked at her quizzically.

"Is that John Casey? There's somebody I didn't expect to see."

* * *

Casey was talking to Lester. I smiled briefly as I noted the bigger man's discomfort. Lester motioned to me, and the two men headed our way.

"You're never going to believe this, Morgan! John here has agreed to help out as a part-time teacher!"

"Seriously?" Anna and I said simultaneously.

"Yeah, who'd have thought? You two should start planning." Lester headed back to talk to Jeff. Anna smiled, glanced at Casey, and quickly headed away.

Casey brusquely motioned me to a corner of the room. "So are you Casey again? Not whatever your name was back at that house?"

Casey grunted.

"How do you people do it? Going from identity to identity just like that?"

"Names are easy. Just slip from one to another, just like going from one pair of pants to another." He glanced at my outfit briefly. "Except I've probably got more identities than you've got pants. Names don't matter anyway. You're still the same person either way."

I briefly considered asking if Casey would still be the same person if he was named Herbert P. Lukenheimer. But I decided I liked my limbs were they were. Instead I said, "So what gives? You don't exactly seem like the teaching type."

Casey grunted again. "Trust me. This is no dream for me. Bartowski may think you can keep a secret, but some of us don't live in his dream world. Randall may not have kept what she found out to herself, but there are still others sniffing around. So somebody has to be here to make sure that a certain moron doesn't let anything slip. Remember, while he may like you, I don't. So I won't hesitate to take steps to make sure you stay quiet."

I wondered whether I could resign from my new position, but figured it probably wouldn't matter. Casey would find me no matter where I was.

"So you were undercover when you were at the Buy More, right?"

He nodded grudgingly.

"And now you're teaching beginning computer courses here. How come you get all the glamorous assignments? Don't they give you a choice?"

"I had my options."

"And you chose this one?" Casey nodded. "Why?"

Casey didn't answer for a moment. Finally, in a voice far removed from his usual growl, he said, "It was my fault."

"What?"

"It was my fault. The disc with Chuck on it. I was supposed to retrieve it and destroy it like a normally do. But we were called on a mission, and I left it sitting out. And that moron Milbarge found it. Bartowski losing his family and everything, that's on me. So I need to fix my mistake."

"It sounds like it was an honest mistake. Anybody could have made it."

"Not me," Casey was back to growling.

"You know what I think? I think you liked Chuck." Casey gave me a rather frightening look in response. "No, I think you feel bad because you really liked Chuck, and didn't want something bad to happen to him." I patted him on the back.

"You want to spend the first day of your new job breathing, don't you?"

"Oh come on, big guy. I'm not buying it. I think this will be the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

The look Casey gave me would lead a bull rhino to tears.

"Ok, maybe the beginning of a grudging tolerance?"

Casey stalked off, muttering "Idiots. Why so many idiots?"

I walked back into the room, and found myself back in front of Chuck's portrait. Even knowing what the painting was supposed to look like, it still didn't seem quite right to me. I could still see what Chuck looked like the last time I had seen him. The mysterious (though somewhat reluctant) hero, standing beside Sarah with a sad smile on his face. Somehow, that image was beginning to seem more real to me than the picture of the man dressed in the Nerd Herd uniform that was now hanging on the wall. I wished I could share that picture with somebody, but Casey was wrong. Knowing everything that he had sacrificed, Chuck's secret is something I would value and honor. But never share.

End

_Well there you have it. I hope you enjoyed the story, and will at take at least 5 minutes or so before you start seeing all the plot holes you could drive a Nerd Herder (or several) through. Thank you to everybody that reviewed (and I hope everyone does so)._


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